New Delhi, Sep 23 (PTI) The Supreme Court on Monday stayed an order of the Madhya Pradesh High Court which restrained recruitment for the post of civil judge carried out without mandatory requirement of three years of practice.
The Madhya Pradesh Judicial Services (Recruitment and Conditions of Service) Rules, 1994 were amended on June 23, 2023, to make three years of practice compulsory to be eligible to appear for the civil judge entry-level test in the state.
The amended rules were upheld by the high court, but it started another round of litigation after two candidates who were not selected contended that they would be eligible if the amended rules were applied and demanded that the cut-off be reviewed.
While restraining recruitment to the post, the high court had directed the exclusion of successful candidates in the preliminary examination who do not fulfil the eligibility criteria under the amended recruitment rules.
An apex court bench of Justices Hrishikesh Roy and SVN Bhatti on Monday issued notice to the petitioners who had approached the high court and sought their reply.
The top court was hearing an appeal filed by the Madhya Pradesh High Court challenging the June 13, 2024 order passed by a division bench which directed it to weed out/exclude all those successful candidates in the preliminary examination held on January 14, 2024, who do not fulfil the eligibility criteria under the Amended Recruitment Rules.
In its appeal filed through Ashwani Kumar Dubey, the high court said the division bench failed to appreciate that the power to review a well-reasoned judgment is very limited and only open when there is a mistake and error apparent on the face of the record.
“It is submitted that the conducting of fresh main examination for specific candidates falling between earlier cut-off marks and re-computed cut-off marks in compliance of impugned order/judgment would result in a situation where there would be no level playing field,” the appeal said.
An advertisement was issued on November 17, 2023, calling for applications from eligible law graduates under the Amended Recruitment Rules.
However, the top court while hearing a challenge to the Amended Recruitment Rules by interim order permitted all law graduates to appear in the preliminary examination.
Later, a division bench of the High Court dismissed petitions challenging the amendment and upheld the Amended Recruitment Rules.
Subsequently, a petition was filed by two petitioners claiming that both are eligible under the Amended Recruitment Rules and had appeared in the preliminary examination but could not make it to the main examination. The petition was dismissed by a division bench of the high court.
The two petitioners, Jyotsna Dohalia and Varsha Shrivastava, then filed a review plea on May 25, 2024, which was allowed and the high court restrained recruitment for the post of civil judge.
As per the amended Madhya Pradesh Judicial Service (Recruitment and Conditions of Service) Rules, 1994, three years of practice was a mandatory requirement to appear for judicial services examination at the civil judge level.
The amendment exempts “outstanding law graduates” who have secured at least 70 per cent marks in the general and Other Backward Class (OBC) categories from the mandatory requirement of three years of practice.
The division bench of the high court in its order had said that the cut-off marks shall be re-computed, upon the remaining candidates satisfying the criteria under amended recruitment rules.
“Fresh call letters be issued to all those eligible candidates under Amended Recruitment Rules who have secured more or equal marks to the re-computed cut-off marks and whose names appear for the first time between the earlier cut-off marks and recomputed cut-off marks, for inviting them to appear in the main examination,” the high court had said on a plea filed by the two candidates seeking directions re-evaluate the marks in accordance with the new eligibility criteria. PTI PKS PKS RT RT
This report is auto-generated from PTI news service. ThePrint holds no responsibility for its content.