Kerala Public Service Commission Can Fill Vacancies That Arise During Validity Of Rank List: Kerala High Court

The Division Bench of Justice A. Muhamed Mustaque and Justice S. Manu observed that the notification clearly stated that the vacancies mentioned are provisional and subject to change according to the allotment of seats and due to rising of more vacancies. Therefore, the general principle that 'filling up of vacancies more than that has been notified is illegal' cannot be applied in the facts of the case at hand.

The High Court said the judgments relied on by the petitioner is not relevant for this case. It observed that none of those cases pertains to a selection process undertaken by the Kerala Public Service Commission in accordance with PSC Rules of Procedure.

“It is trite law that circumstantial flexibility, one additional or different fact may make a world of difference between conclusions in two cases. Disposal of cases by blindly placing reliance on a decision without proper analysis of factual matrices involved in the precedent and the case arising for consideration is not proper.”

The petitioner was challenging the decision given by the Kerala Administrative Tribunal while deciding his petition. The petitioner is a Beat Forest Officer in The Forest and Wildlife Department. Kerala Public Service Commission issued a notification for recruitment to seven vacancies of Forest Range Officer. The vacancy was to be filled by the transfer/recruitment of in-service candidates.

The ranked list for this post was published and 40 candidates were recruited from the list. In the notice, it is given that to be eligible, the person must have a minimum 5 years of service. The petitioner did not have this required experience when the notification was published. The petition argues that the Commission cannot recruit more than seven persons by this notification.

The respondent argued that the Application had been filed without proper knowledge of the rules and procedures followed by the Commission. In the notification, it was mentioned that the ranked list prepared would be valid for one month form the date of commencement of training or three months from the date of the ranked list coming into force, whichever is later. The Commission argued that that they can use this list to recruit to vacancies that may arise also, till this list is valid.

The Court said that the petition is liable to be rejected on the ground that the petitioner did not have the requisite eligibility as required by the notification at that time. Therefore, he cannot legally challenge the notification. Moreover, the notification was challenged after a period of more than five years. This, the court observed, can be considered only as a 'highly belated experimental litigation'. However, since the petition was admitted and the respective counsels were elaborately heard, it decided the case on the merits.

The petitioner had also challenged the validity of Rule 14. The Court refused to entertain it as this contention was not raised before the Administrative Tribunal. The Court said that it does not have jurisdiction to entertain reliefs and grounds not raised before the Tribunal.

Counsel for Appellants: Advocates Rekha Vasudevan, Elizabeth V. Joseph, Rojit Zachariah

Counsel for Respondents: Senior Government Pleader A. T. Varghese, Prasanth Sugathan, Varsha Bhaskar, Anupama Sibi, N. Krishna Ozhakkanat

Citation: 2024 LiveLaw (Ker) 335

Case Title: Sijo Thomas v State of Kerala and Others

Case No.: OP (KAT) No. 215 of 2023