All-Time High Unemployment Due To Hurdles Created By ‘Petty Technicalities’ & Misuse Of Discretionary Powers: Calcutta HC

The Calcutta High Court has recently observed that the lack of efficient mechanisms in providing employment to youth, has led to a large percentage of the country’s population being unemployed.

Court was dealing with challenges against the action of the Additional District Inspector of Schools (SE), Purba Medinapur in the recruitment process to hire one clerk and two laboratory attendants, being carried out by the managing committee of Marishda BKJ Banipith School,

In setting aside memos by the Additional District Inspector of Schools (SE), Purba Medinapur, which had dissolved the panels for appointment of Group C & D staff (clerk & lab attendant), published by the school, a bench of Justice Shekhar B Saraf held:

Rather than encouraging the citizens of India to actively seek out jobs and contribute to the flourishing of the nation, institutions have frustrated the youth by creating hurdles borne out of petty technicalities and have misused the discretionary power enshrined on them. Rather than employing combined efforts to ensure the position is filled up, what has ensured is years of legal disputes. Therefore, this court sets aside the impugned memo of the Additional District Inspector of Schools (SE), Purba Medinapur dated July 3, 2020.

Court further denied any relief to the petitioners, who were prospective candidates in the recruitment processes, upon noting that the filling up of vacancies in the Group C and D category could only be carried out by the WB School Service Commission and not by any Managing Committee.

It was also observed that the petitioners would not have any vested right of selection or employment.

Brief facts

In earlier writ petitions in 2009 and 2013, a coordinate bench of the Court had directed for grant of prior permission to the managing committee of the school for appointment to the position of clerk. Such permission was granted by the DI in June 2016, which led to the school seeking names of eligible candidates from the local employment exchange.

Subsequently, the school also published a newspaper advertisement in April 2017 inviting applications from eligible candidates to fill up the relevant positions, to which the petitioners had applied.

The subsequent interviews to be held in February 2019 were postponed to 2020 and the school authorities did not receive any approval or rejection for the same from the DI even after notifying their office of the same.

Panels for recruitment to positions of both the clerk and lab assistant positions were submitted to the office of the Additional DI (“ADI”), who disapproved of the same on various grounds and published memos dissolving the aforesaid panels.

Grounds for such rejection were that the school had failed to approach the local employment exchange within 45 days of initiation of recruitment, school authorities postponed the date of interview without DI approval, and no candidate could be appointed before 18 years of age, whereas the first candidate in the panel was only 16 years old on the date of reference.

The present petitions were filed for setting aside the memos issued by the additional DI and for the appointment of the petitioners to the relevant positions.

Petitioners argued that the decision of the ADI was not tenable, and that the grounds raised by the ADI for setting aside the panels of selection were not only untenable in law, but also fell afoul of well-settled case law on the subject.

Counsel for the respondents argued that the ADI was well justified in rejecting the panels on the grounds that the petitioner had not annexed his application in response to the advertisement for the position, and had failed to annexe copies of the call letter issued by the school authorities.

It was argued that under the latest recruitment rules, panels may be cancelled and the resultant vacancy could be forwarded to the WB School Service Commission.

Counsel relied on the Supreme Court decision in the case of State of West Bengal & Ors. vs. The Managing Committee, Nirjharini S.B. Vidyalaya (H.S) Etc (2017) to highlight that the mere initiation of a selection process pursuant to new recruitment rules would not create any vested rights in favour of the candidates.

Findings of the Court

In dealing with the rival submissions, the Court identified four major issues. Firstly, whether the time limit of 45 days was mandatory, secondly, whether the panel could be rejected due to postponement of the interview.

Thirdly, Court deliberated on whether the age of the candidate was to be considered from date of vacancy notification or from date of advertisement and fourthly, whether the rules of 2009 or 2005 would apply and whether the petitioners could get any relief.

In dealing with the 45 day time limit, the Bench held that procedural laws cannot frustrate the objectives of the Act they sought to fulfil. It was observed that procedural law ought not to thwart the intent of the act, and that while mandatory conditions must be complied with, noncompliance of directionary provisions should not warrant harsh penalties. It held:

If noncompliance with the time frame results in the cancellation of the entire selection process, the appointment process is frustrated and appointment is delayed rather than made more efficient. It cannot be said that the framers of the Rules intended for such mischief. Therefore, the time frame is directionary in nature and noncompliance with the time frame of 45 days as enshrined under Rule 8 (5) (a) does not warrant complete cancellation of the selection panel.

On the issue about the postponement of the interviews resulting in cancellation of the panel, the Court noted that the DI’s office had been informed of the same by the school, and that after keeping silent despite being intimated about the changed date, the ADI could not penalise the school for the same.

On the issue of the petitioner’s age, the Court held that, as was well-settled, the qualification of a candidate shall be examine on the last date of the application, unless otherwise specified. It was held that the ADI had ignored well settled legal principles on the subject and that the petitioner was qualified for position of clerk.

Finally, in noting that the recruitment process began in 2017, after the initiation of the 2009 recruitment rules, the Court noted that the managing committee has no power to fill up the position of clerk and the authority to fill the position of clerk is to be done by the West Bengal School Service Commission as per the 2009 Rules.

It was accordingly concluded that while the memos of the ADI, dissolving the panels published by the school would be set aside, the petitioners could not be granted any relief pertaining to the same, due to their selection not being a vested right.

Citation: 2023 LiveLaw (Cal) 328

Case: Arnab Roy v State of WB & Ors with another connected application.

Case No: WPA 7283 of 2020 with WPA 507 of 2021

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