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4. In the year 2016, the said UGC guidelines were amended vide UGC (Minimum Qualifications for Appointment of Teachers and other Academic Staff in Universities and Colleges and measures for the Maintenance of Standards in Higher Education) (4th Amendment) Regulations, 2016 and the method of calculation of scores was modified where the new tables as substituted by the said amendment provided for more objective way of calculation of the API scores.

15. It is also submitted that the scope of the Screening Committee while considering the application for promotion from Stage I to Stage II of the Assistant professor is limited to verification of the API scores secured by the candidates and if the same stands satisfied, the committee ought to recommend the candidate for promotion and therefore, no discretion is provided to the Screening Committee in rejecting the name of the candidate once the API score and the eligibility criteria are met.

22. It is submitted that Regulation 6.3.4 provides for promotion of the Assistant Professor from a lower grade to a higher grade and the same mandates the 'Screening-cum-evaluation committee' to adhere to the criteria as laid down in the API score.

23. It is submitted that Regulation 6.3.6 prescribes the Screening Committee to verify the score and then recommend the said candidate to the Executive Council about the suitability of the candidates to be promoted under the CAS scheme and the term suitability is not an objective term rather the same needs to be interpreted by the Screening Committee on a case to case basis and a decision related to the promotion or non-promotion of a particular candidate cannot be judicially reviewed.

28. In his submissions, counsel for the petitioner has submitted that the respondent University has misinterpreted the guidelines of the UGC where the word 'shall' as mentioned in the relevant provision, i.e. Regulation 6.3.6 of the UGC Regulations, 2010 is a term where the screening committee is only empowered to 'recommend' or 'not to recommend' the case of the petitioner on the basis of API scores and there is no weightage given to any other factors. Therefore, the suitability is decided solely only on the basis of the API score and there is no scope for further discretion.