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3. Heard Mr. Anthony Debbarma, learned counsel appearing for the petitioner. Also heard Mr. D. Sarma, learned Addl. GA appearing for the respondents-State, Mr. Raju Datta, learned counsel appearing for the respondents-TPSC and Mr. P. Majumder and Mr. D. Saha, learned counsel appearing for the respondent no.5.

4. Contentions of the petitioner:

Mr. Debbarma, learned counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioner has submitted that in the API score, the petitioner was awarded 100 marks and the respondent no.5 obtained 90 marks. The petitioner has no grievance as regards the awarding of marks in regard to the API score. However, the grievance of the petitioner is that the respondent no.5 was awarded 14 marks out of 15 marks, which is excessively high and the Selection Board has arbitrarily awarded only 5 marks in favour of the petitioner. As such, the entire selection panel had acted arbitrarily against the petitioner.

6. Contentions of the respondents-State:

Mr. Sarma, learned Addl. GA for the respondents-State has adopted the submission of Mr. Datta, learned counsel appearing for the respondents- TPSC.

7. Contentions on behalf of respondent no.5:

Mr. Majumder, learned counsel for the respondent no.5 has drawn the attention of this Court to a chart in tabular form reflected in the counter affidavit as regards the modes of computing the API score and made submissions in similar tune to that of Mr. Datta, learned counsel appearing for the respondents-TPSC.

8. I have considered the submissions of learned counsel appearing for the parties.

9. Discussion and conclusion:

9.1. Keeping in mind the facts and submissions of learned counsel appearing for the parties, it will be profitable to reproduce the table showing the awarding of marks in computing total API score of the petitioner and respondent no.5. The API score calculation of the petitioner and the respondent no.5 is reproduced hereunder in tabular form:

Thereafter, the final merit list was prepared on the basis of marks awarded in the interview/personality test and the 85% of API marks. The marks of API and interview/personality test are as follows:

Sl Name of Total API 85% of Marks obtained in Total marks obtained No. candidate Score API Score the interview (Out (out of 100) of 15) 1 Kakali Dhar 90 76.50 14 90.50 2 Subrata 100 85.00 5 90.00 Debbarma 9.2. In my opinion, this is not a fit case where this Court can exercise its extraordinary and discretionary jurisdiction as vested upon it under Article 226 of the Constitution of India. The Court's power to overstep the decision of the Selection Committee is very limited. It is settled proposition of law that when a Selection Committee recommends the selection of a person, the same cannot be presumed to have been done in an errorneous or mistaken manner in the absence of any allegation of bias or favouritism. In the absence of allegation of malafides against the members, selection by a Selection Committee should not be interfered with. Further, this Court cannot act as an appellate authority over the selection of the candidates in exercise of its jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution of India. In the case of Madan Lal vs. State of J&K, (1995) 3 SCC 486, the Hon'ble Supreme Court held that it was in the exclusive domain of the expert committee to evaluate the merits of the candidates appearing before it and the marks to be awarded against each of the candidates after assessing their merits. In the process, some candidates may secure more marks than the unsuccessful candidates. In such a case, the Court cannot sit as a Court of Appeal over the assessment made by such expert committee.