Calcutta High Court (Appellete Side)
Krishna Mondal vs The State Of West Bengal & Ors on 6 December, 2010
Author: Biswanath Somadder
Bench: Biswanath Somadder
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06.12.10
(SKB)
W.P. No. 5158(W) OF 2010
Krishna Mondal
Versus
The State of West Bengal & Ors.
Mr. Pratip Kr. Chatterjee,
Mr. A. S. Chatterjee .....for the petitioner.
Mrs. Santi Das .....for the Council.
Mr. Saikat Banerjee .....for the State.
Having heard the learned advocates for the parties and upon perusing the
instant writ petition and taking into consideration the report, filed by the
Chairman, District Primary School Council, Murshidabad, it appears beyond any
shadow of doubt that the writ petitioner was treated as an unreserved General
category candidate, due to a bona fide mistake on her part, while filling up the
bio-data form. A photocopy of the bio-data form reveals that under Serial No.7,
wherein an applicant has to state whether he/she belongs to General category or
Physically Handicapped or Ex-Defence Person or other Exempted category, the
writ petitioner has put '1' as the code which denotes 'General' category. However,
by the side of the code, she has also written 'S.C.'. On a closer scrutiny of Serial
No.7 of the bio-data form, there appears to be some confusion with regard to the
code numbers attributed to the various categories of person, in the absence of
any punctuation mark such as a semicolon or a gap/space between the
respective categories. That the petitioner's intention was bona fide, is more than
apparent, when one looks at the letters 'S.C.' written by her against code no.'1'.
The letters 'S.C.' was obviously an attempt on her part to reiterate in the
application form that she belongs to the 'S.C.' category. This is not a case where
the writ petitioner is trying to steal a march by taking any undue benefit from the
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Council. This is simply a case of an inadvertent oversight or at the most, as
observed hereinbefore, a bona fide mistake.
For the above reasons, this Court is of the view that the writ petitioner
should be allowed to be treated as a 'S.C.' category candidate by the concerned
Council. The Council is, therefore, directed to process her recruitment papers
accordingly and ensure that she is provided a berth at the first available vacant
slot in the 'S.C.' category, either within the framework of the present recruitment
process or in the next recruitment process. The respondent authorities, needless
to say, shall consider her as an eligible candidate, on the basis of her performance in the present selection process, wherein she participated and was successful.
The writ petition stands disposed of accordingly. Urgent photostat certified copy of this order, if applied for, be given to the learned advocates for the parties.
(Biswanath Somadder, J.)