Important Laws covered in the case are:
Judicial review under Article 226 of the Constitution.
Background of case
The present batch of appeals has been preferred by the candidates who on qualifying the 6th Combined Civil Services Examination, 2016, conducted by respondent no.3, Jharkhand Public Service Commission (hereinafter referred to as "the Commission") and having been appointed on the recommendations made by the Commission, completed their period of probation and got regular postings, their appointments have been cancelled initially by the learned Single Judge.
Facts of the case
In terms of the Bihar ReOrganisation Act, 2000, Bihar Civil Services (Executive Branch) and Bihar Junior Civil Services (Recruitment) Rules, 1951(hereinafter referred to as the "Rules 1951") was adopted by the State of Jharkhand vide notification no.6184 dated 9th November, 2002 and accordingly, the State of Jharkhand held its Combined Civil Service Examination in terms of the Rules 1951.
That prior to the present selection process which came to be initiated by the Commission pursuant to Advertisement no.1/2015, the respondents held 5th Combined Civil Services Examination conducted by the Commission pursuant to Advertisement no.6/2013 dated 7th July, 2013, there was a specific note in the advertisement that preliminary examination had two papers of 100 marks each and there shall be subject papers in the main examination and that the marks obtained in General Hindi will not be added in the marks obtained in the written examination and personality test, but the candidates who failed to secure 30 marks in compulsory General Hindi, will not be considered eligible for the written examination and accordingly PaperI (General Hindi) was considered to be a qualifying test and before the 6th Combined Civil Services Examination, 2016 came to be notified, there was a series of meetings held by the Expert Committee for revision of the examination pattern for Combined Civil Services Examination chaired by Mr. V.S. Dubey, IAS (Retd.) and the Expert Committee, after examining the Pattern of Examination, made the recommendations1.
The report of the Dubey Committee was considered by the Commission in the first instance and recommended the same to Respondent No.1 for acceptance, inter alia, with the stipulations all the successful candidates in the written examination who fell in the zone of consideration were called for viva voce and the result of the candidates who qualified and successfully cleared all the stages, the final merit list was published of the selected candidates by the Commission Several writ petitions later on came to be filed before the learned Single Judge of the High Court assailing the result of the main examination
Question in matter
●Whether the merit list prepared by the JPSC based upon the 'aggregate qualifying marks' of all subjects or 'minimum qualifying marks' in each of the subjects, is considered to be correct?
●Whether the marks obtained in PaperI were to be added in total marks?
Judgment Stated
The stand which has been taken by the JPSC as also the State before the Court of law based upon which the order has been passed in Joy Guria (supra) is correct approach. Minimum qualifying marks' in each subject (Main Examination) is correct interpretation.
Reference cases used in judgment
Joy Guria Vs. State of Jharkhand and others
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