SC Upholds HC Decision To Quash Manipur Public Service Commission Exam, 2016; Direction For CBI Enquiry

In its order dated October 18, the high court had held that the examination was liable to be quashed, on account of numerous irregularities and illegalities, in the process of conducting the said exam.

It had then remarked,

"MPSC has no intention to conduct any examination in a fair and just manner. It had, in the present case, miserably failed to discharge its duties and functions as mandated in the Constitution of India. It would like to continue holding examinations, only in name, with a half baked rules so that it could manipulate it."

Concurring with the above observations, the bench of Justice Shantanagoudar and Justice Sanjiv Khanna, dismissed a batch of petitions filed against the high court's order.

The bench also upheld high court's direction to CBI to conduct a time bound investigation into the conduct of the said examination.

In its order, the high court had directed the CBI to investigate into the conduct of the Main Examination, 2016 by the MPSC within three months and to take appropriate action thereafter in accordance with law. It had remarked,

"It is the right time for the MPSC or for that matter, its staff or officials to be penalized for their misdeeds which they have been doing for the last many years and if not penalized now, they would continue to do so in future at the cost of public interest and public money."

The high court had found the following discrepancies in the examination process to be fatal:

1. Non-appointment of the Controller of Examination given the essential and extensive duties devolved upon him.
2. Non-laying down the procedure for the evaluation and tabulation of answer books which consequently gave licence to the examiner to do whatever he feels like. Certainly, one examiner had taken answer sheets to his home outside Manipur for evaluation.
3. Declaration of the result of Main Examination, 2016, even when the evaluation of the last subject was concluded only a day prior to such declaration. The court found it hard to believe that the scrutiny would have been carried out in few hours prior to the declaration of the result and that too, in the night.
4. Moderation or scaling of marks was not adopted by the MPSC, in clear violation of the law laid down by the Supreme Court.
5. Violation of directions issued by the high court in H. Bobby Sharma v. MPSC, WP(C) No.150 of 2013, prescribing that the qualifying criteria for an examination should to be in conformity with the criteria fixed by UPSC.

Noting that the appointments made in lieu of the said examination were violative of Article 14 and 16 of the Constitution, the high court had then declared all such appointments to be void.

Arguments on behalf of the Respondent students were advanced by Advocates Indira Jaisingh and Prashant Bhushan.

To read a detailed account of the high court's order, click here.