District Judge Aspirant To Get Appointment As Supreme Court Quashes HC's Interview Cut-Off Criteria As Contrary To Rules

After a legal battle of nine years, a District Judge aspirant got relief as the Supreme Court recently held him eligible for appointment after invalidating the decision of the Manipur High Court to prescribe minimum cut-off marks for interview.

The petitioner, Salam Samarjeet Singh, appeared for the written test for the District Judge (Entry Level) in the Manipur Judicial Service Grade-I in July 2013. He was successful in the written examination having scored 52.8% marks. Just before the interview test, the Full Court of the Manipur High Court on 12.01.2015 decided to fix 40% as the cut-off for the viva-voce examination.  The petitioner was unsuccessful in the interview as he secured only 18.8 marks out of the total 50 marks in the interview segment. 

Although the cumulative marks of both the written test and interview were more than 50%, since he did not meet the separate 40% cut-off requirement for the interview, he was declared unsuccessful. Challenging the High Court's decision, the petitioner filed a writ petition in the Supreme Court in 2015. A two-judge bench delivered a split verdict in 2016 and the matter was referred to a three-judge bench.

A bench comprising Justices Hrishikesh Roy, Sudhanshu Dhulia and SVN Bhatti delivered its judgment on August 22 (uploaded on August 31) upholding the petitioner's claim. The bench noted that the relevant statutory rule governing the recruitment of District Judges, the Manipur Judicial Service Rules, 2005, did not provide for a separate cut-off for interview. Hence, such a requirement could not have been introduced through a Full Court resolution without amending the rules. Also, the requirement of a separate cut-off for the interview was not specified in the advertisement and was introduced only after the written test, that too without intimating the candidates.

The bench relied on the Constitution Bench judgment in Sivanandan C.T. v. High Court of Kerala 2023 LiveLaw (SC) 658 which held that the Kerala High Court erred in fixing the minimum cut-off for viva-voce contrary to the rules.

The High Court's counsel relied on the recent judgments in Dr.Kavita Kamboj v. High Court of Punjab and Haryana 2024 LiveLaw (SC) 174 and Abhimeet Sinha v.High Court of Judicature at Patna 2024 LiveLaw (SC) 350 which upheld the minimum cut-off marks for the interview.

The bench observed that the prescription of minimum cut-off marks was by itself not arbitrary. The only question is whether it could be prescribed contrary to the method prescribed under the rules. In this case, the relevant provision of the Manipur Judicial Services Rules prescribed that the final selection list will be prepared by combining the cumulative grade value obtained in the written examination and viva-voce examination. It is a different matter that after the present recruitment, the Rules were amended in 2016 to incorporate the minimum cut-off for interview.

In Abhimeet Sinha, the Court was adjudicating upon the validity of the Rule which prescribed a minimum cut-off mark for interview, which was upheld. Distinguishing this judgment, the Court observed :

"..in our view, even though prescribing minimum marks for interview may not be manifestly arbitrary, the present case is on the failure to make the selection, in accordance with the unamended MJS Rules, based on aggregate marks secured by the petitioner in the written examination and the viva-voce test."

Kavita Kamboj was a case where the Rules were silent on the mode of evaluation. In such a scenario, the Full Court resolution prescribing minimum cut-off for interview was held to be supplementing the Rules. 

"In the present case, the Resolution (12.1.2015) prescribing qualifying marks for viva voce is not a case of supplementing the rules but appears to us as a case where the Rules pertaining to the final selection of candidates, have been substituted," the Court observed distinguishing Kavita Kamboj. 

The Court held that the judgment in Sivanandan CT is more applicable to the present case.

"In view of the above discussion, we hold that the executive instructions cannot override statutory Rules where the method of final selection by combining the cumulative grade value obtained in the written and the viva voce examinations is specified categorically."

Legitimate expectation of the petitioner violated

The Court also found that the introduction of the criteria violated the legitimate expectation of the candidate.

"Prescribing minimum marks for viva voce segment may be justified for the holistic assessment of a candidate, but in the present case such a requirement was introduced only after commencement of the recruitment process and in violation of the statutory rules. The decision of the Full Court to depart from the expected exercise of preparing the merit list as per the unamended Rules is clearly violative of the substantive legitimate expectation of the petitioners. It also fails the tests of fairness, consistency, and predictability and hence is violative of Article 14 of the Constitution of India," the judgment authored by Justice Roy stated.

The argument that a candidate who participated in the selection process cannot turn around and challenge it was rejected on the basis of the settled proposition that estoppel cannot override law. Reference was made to Dr.(Major) Meeta Sahai Vs. Union of India (2019) 20 SCC 17.

The Court also noted that despite getting more than 50% marks in the written exam, he was only called for the interview round after he filed a Right to Information (RTI) Application to know his marks.

The Court also noted that the petitioner belonged to the Scheduled Caste category.

"It would be unjustified to deny the sole SC candidate, who successfully qualified both the written exam and the interview, in accordance with the then existing rules," it observed.

Thus, the High Court was directed to declare the petitioner successful and appoint him. However, the appointed petitioner will be entitled to seniority only from the date of his appointment. The petitioner shall not be entitled to any actual monetary benefits for any period prior to his appointment. The appointee should be given notional seniority from the year 2015 when the interview was conducted. This notional seniority is only for the purpose of superannuation benefits.

Appearances 

For petitioner: Senior Advocate Rana Mukherjee, Advocates Ahanthem Romen Singh, Oindriala Sen, Mohan Singh, Aniket Rajput, Khoisnam Nirmala Devi, Rajiv Mehta

For respondents: Senior Advocate Vijay Hansaria, Advocates Maibam Nabaghanashyam Singh, Kavya Jhawar,Nandini Rai

Case Title : Salam Samarjeet Singh v. High Court of Manipur at Imphal | WRIT PETITION (CIVIL) NO.294/2015

Citation : 2024 LiveLaw (SC) 636

Click here to read the judgment