Central Administrative Tribunal - Delhi
Praveen Kumar vs Railway Board on 11 December, 2025
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Item No. 47 O.A. No. 291/2024
Court No. IV
Central Administrative Tribunal
Principal Bench,
New Delhi
O.A. No. 291/2024
This the 11th day of December, 2025
Hon'ble Mr. Manish Garg, Member (J)
Hon'ble Dr. Anand S Khati, Member (A)
Praveen Kumar
S/o Om Prakash
R/o Pawan Sut Colony,
Hurawali Tiraha Morar
Gwalior District
Madhya Pradesh-474006
...Applicant
(Through Advocate(s): Mr. Setu Niket
Ms. Esha Mazumdar)
Versus
1. Union of India
Through Chairman
Railway Board,
Rail Bhawan Rafi Marg,
New Delhi-110001
2. Northern Railway
Through General Manager
Baroda House
New Delhi-110001
3. Railway Recruitment Cell
Through Chairperson
Lajpat Nagar-I,
New Delhi-24
...Respondents
(Through Advocate(s):Mr. R S Rana with
ANKIT Mr. Vikas Chaurasia, CLA/NRHQ
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Mr. Arjun Kumar, Sr. Clerk/RRS
10:40:07+02'00' Mr. Dharmendra Singh, CLA/NRHQ)
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Item No. 47 O.A. No. 291/2024
Court No. IV
ORDER (ORAL)
Hon'ble Mr. Manish Garg, Member (J) By way of the present O.A. the applicant seeks following reliefs:-
"8. A. Call for records of the case:
B. Quash and set aside rejection order dated 25/09/2023 issued by the Respondents;
C. Pass an order directing the Respondents to the appoint the applicant pursuant to selection of the Applicant in CEN No. 01/2019 and direct Respondents to grant all consequential benefits including arrears with interest;
D. Award cost of the proceedings: and E. Pass any order/relief/direction(s) as this Hon'ble Tribunal may deem fit and proper in the interest of justice in favour of the Applicant."
2. Highlighting the facts of the present case, learned counsel for the applicant states that the case of the applicant is that the candidature of the applicant has been rejected by the respondents on the ground that his biometrics were not verified followed by mismatch reported by Handwriting expert in Handwriting and / or signature on relevant papers.
2.1. He submits that even assuming for the sake of the arguments, as contended in the counter affidavit that an ANKIT expert was appointed, the copy of the same was not ANKIT SAKLANI SAKLANI 2025.12.24 10:40:07+02'00' supplied. He further submits that verification expert was 3 Item No. 47 O.A. No. 291/2024 Court No. IV hired from a private agency and in light of the decision rendered by this Tribunal in O.A. No. 3628/2013 decided on 09.11.2021 titled as Dev Dutt Vs. Union of India & Ors., the respondents ought to have carried out the mismatch of the analyses by CFSL rather than a private individual expert. He further submits that the said observations made in the matter of Dev Dutt is based on the decision rendered in the matter of Praveed Vs. Union of India and Ors. in W.P. (C) No. 2975/2021 decided on 05.03.2021 by the Hon'ble High Court of Delhi. 2.2. He further draws attention to the fact that Hon'ble High court of Madhya Pradesh in W.P. (C) No. 8990/2020 decided on 25.03.2025 in the matter of Vinod Kumar Meena Vs. Life Insurance Corporation of India, has considered issue of biometrics and highlights the observations so made therein, which reads as under:-
"18. In this regard, this Court is of the considered opinion that although it is true that the biometric verification process is necessary nowadays to eliminate any discrepancy in the record, and to ensure free and fair process of selection, however, it is also true that biometric verification is not always successful in eliminating the discrepancies, like in the present case, and there are occasions when biometric verification of a candidate cannot be done due to myriads of reasons, beyond the control of the parties.
19. In the circumstances, can it be said that only on account ANKIT of failure on the part of a machine, a person's rightful claim ANKIT SAKLANI can be rejected, and the answer is an emphatic 'no', as this SAKLANI 2025.12.24 Court is of the considered opinion that a person's legal and 10:40:07+02'00' fundamental right cannot be curtailed or side-lined only on 4 Item No. 47 O.A. No. 291/2024 Court No. IV account of failure of a machine to recognize him, for whatever be the reasons.
20. This Court is also of the considered opinion that a person's identity is not lost when he is not recognized by a machine, and in such circumstances, his claim has to be verified on the basis of the documents which he possesses regarding his identification, like Aadhaar Card, Samagra ID, Pan Card, Driving License, Passport, etc.
21. In view of the aforesaid discussion, this Court has no hesitation to hold that such condition that biometric verification by the TCS would be binding on the petitioner, does not stand the test judicial scrutiny and of reasonableness, and is liable to be quashed.
22. In such circumstances, since the petitioner's biometric verification was found to be successful at the time of entering the examination hall, and taking note of the fact that it is nobody's case that any fraud is played by the petitioner, this Court finds it expedient to direct the respondent to verify the petitioner's identity on the basis of the documents in his possession, and issue the appointment letter to the petitioner within further four weeks' time.
23. Resultantly, the petition stands allowed. The impugned order dated 29.02.2020 is hereby quashed and the respondent is directed to issue appointment letter to the petitioner within further four weeks along with all the consequential benefits except monetary benefits.
24. With the aforesaid, the petitions stand allowed and disposed of."
3. On the other hand, learned counsel for the respondents vehemently opposes the grant of relief in the present matter. He states that neither the handwriting of the applicant matched nor the biometric verification is in favour of the applicant.
3.1. He does not dispute the fact that an expert was appointed which was duly authorized by the competent ANKIT ANKIT SAKLANI authority and the observations made by the private SAKLANI 2025.12.24 10:40:07+02'00' 5 Item No. 47 O.A. No. 291/2024 Court No. IV examiner cannot be denied merely because it was done by a private individual.
3.2. He further draws attention to the averments made in the counter affidavit, which reads as under:-
"That the contents of the corresponding Paras, to the extent of being matter of record, need no reply. It _is submitted the applicant of the OA was called for document verification/medical examination with reserving the right to the calling of candidate does not automatically confer any right upon the candidate for his appointment on any post of Northern Railway. During Document Verification before the committee of three Railway officers nominated for the purpose of all the candidates including applicant subjected for Biometric verification taken during the CBT Examination (Computer Based Test) and PET (Physical Efficiency Test.) This Biometric verification test reported the mismatch Biometric of the CBT of applicant. Accordingly, a suspicion arose about the genuineness of the candidature of the candidate regarding the writings & signature of the candidates on relevant papers, it was decided to get the case to be examined from EX. Government Examiner for Questionable Documents nominated by the Ministry of Railways about the matching handwriting & signatures on relevant papers i.e. CBT E-Admit Card, PETE-Admit Card, DV E-Admit Card & DV papers containing sample of handwriting & signatures taken at various stages i.e. on CBT Admit card during PET followed a sample taken by DV committee during document verification.
On receipt of report confirming the mismatch in Handwriting/Signature on relevant papers and applicant also have violated the examination/notification condition by handwriting/signature in different at time of Computer Best Test, Physical Efficiency Test, Document Verification. Hence the applicant's case was rejected by the competent authority and the status was uploaded in the form of order on RRC website for the information of candidate which is the main source of communication with the candidates as already notified in notification."
4. The original record of the case was also summoned.
This has been produced by the departmental
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5. Having the heard the learned counsels for the parties and perused the records of the case.
6. First of all we will examine the report of the Forensic Document Examiner, Sh. D.D. Goel, M.Sc. dated 17.07.2023, who opined as follows:-
"1. The person who wrote the blue enclosed writings marked S1 and S2 did not right the blue enclosed writings marked Q1 and Q4.
2. The blue enclosed writings marked Q2, Q3, S1 and S2 were all written by the one and the same person."
6.1. The records would reveal that document verification was called on 13.03.2023. Three members of the committee verified the documents as per the Document Verification Cum Medical Examination Cen. RRC- 01/2019 the applicant is shown to be "Provisionally Eligible". In the column where it has been mentioned that the reasons if declared Provisionally Eligible or Negligible, it has been highlighted that reasons assigned is "Signature mismatch with Registration Form". 6.2. We also noticed that in Registration Form there is a column of suspicious candidate be freezen, however the said 2 columns remains unfilled by the committee nor there is any other remark by the Committee.
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6.3. On perusal of the records, it also appears that there is an ambiguity in the observations made in the opinion word enclosed "writings" has been used at serial number 1 and in second line "not right". We fail to understand how these observations have been made, as it has to be a word 'writing' or otherwise.
6.4. Though Mr. Vikas Chaurasia, CLA/NRHQ is present alongwith the original records, but, he is unable to show the Registration Form. We presume that the Registration form is in fact the actual application form filled by the applicant, which clear the signature of the applicant. Probably the records also reveals that the said document has also not been supplied to the private examiner to verify the veracity of the claim as contended by the by the Committee Members, who verified the documents on 13.03.2023.
6.5. We also observe that the last page of the records the biometric authentication has been authenticated. There are two left and right thumb impression alongwith the signatures. Call letter for Physical Efficiency test is verified, biometrics authentication call letter for ANKIT ANKIT SAKLANI computer base also shows that biometrics authenticated.
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7. In view of the above and present factual matrix of the case, we are guided by the above fact that the grievances of the applicant has been examined in the matter of Dev Dutt and coupled with the observations made in Vinod Kumar Meena, we deem it appropriate dispose of the present matter by directing the respondents to send the documents of the applicant to the CFSL for examination by the Railway authority within a period of 15 days from the date of receipt of a copy of this order. Ordered accordingly. On receipt of the request of the Railway authority, the CFSL shall give their report in this regard within a period of six weeks thereafter to the Railway authority, on the basis of which the Railway authority shall take a final decision as regards the employment of the applicant to the post in question.
8. We also take note of the fact that the opinion which has been referred only relates to the signature / hand writing and not of the biometrics authentication.
9. Original record produced before us has been returned to the departmental representatives after perusal.
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10. Accordingly, the present O.A. is disposed of in above terms. All pending M.As, if any, shall also stand dispose of. No order as to costs.
(Dr. Anand S Khati) (Manish Garg)
Member (A) Member (J)
/SG/
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