Indian Kanoon - Search engine for Indian Law

III. The basic principle of service jurisprudence ought to be known by the high ranking administrative officers of the State of Jharkhand. Long list of selected candidates cannot be prepared so that the appointment from the said reservoir may continue for one decade.

Vacancy ought to have been mentioned in the advertisement. Life of the select list ought to have been mentioned either in rules or in the advertisement or in same circular by the State Government without which, there will be full arbitrariness on the part of the Government to appoint the candidates towards future vacancy. The basic concept of the service jurisprudence is that future vacancy cannot be filled up from the given advertisement, hence, the vacancy ought to have been mentioned in the public advertisement. The list of selected candidates cannot remain, as reservoir, for all the time to come, till the selected candidates attained the age of 60 years. There is the grossest violation by the State of Jharkhand while giving such type of public advertisement. We therefore, direct the State of Jharkhand not to publish such type of advertisement, henceforth, which does not contain the total number of vacancy.

Although the circular was issued in 1983 but it only attempted to clarify what was the implied purpose of a waiting list. Even without it, the operation of a waiting list should be confined to the vacancies notified for that examination and not for any vacancy arising in future unless a policy decision is taken by the Government to that effect. Appointment in future vacancies from waiting list prepared by the Commission should be exception rather than the rule. It has many ramifications. In any case, the High Court should not have assumed upon itself the role of appointing authority unless it found that the Government was acting arbitrarily. No rule has been shown that selection of direct recruits was to take place every year. In absence of such rule, the proviso could not apply. However, its validity was not challenged either in the High Court or in this Court. It has, therefore, to be construed so as not to defeat the objective of its

"10. Recruitment process, as is well known, must be commensurate with the statute or the statutory rule operating in the field. We have noticed hereinbefore, advertisement was made for three posts. It was not indicated therein that another panel for filling up of the future vacancies was to be prepared by the Selection Committee. In the select list prepared by the Selection Committee, the name of the 1st respondent was at Sl. No.

4. Recommendations were made containing the names of 19 persons for future vacancies. Only because a panel has been prepared by the Selection Committee, the same by itself, in our opinion, would not mean that the same should be given effect to irrespective of the fact that there was no such rule operating in the field. The Selection Committee was bound to comply with the selection process only in terms of the extant rules. It was bound to follow the stipulations made in the advertisement itself. Even in the advertisement it was not indicated that a select list would be prepared for filling up of future vacancies. The Selection Committee, having been appointed only for recommending the names of suitable candidates, who were fit to be appointed, could not have embarked upon the question as regards likelihood of future vacancy.

"33. At the outset it should be noticed that the select list prepared by APSC could be used to fill the notified vacancies and not future vacancies. If the requisition and advertisement was only for 27 posts, the State cannot appoint more than the number of posts advertised, even though APSC had prepared a select list of 64 candidates. The select list got exhausted when all the 27 posts were filled. Thereafter, the candidates below the 27 appointed candidates have no right to claim appointment to any vacancy in regard to which selection was not held. The fact that evidently and admittedly the names of the appellants appeared in the select list dated 17-7-2000 below the persons who have been appointed on merit against the said 27 vacancies, and as such they could not have been appointed in excess of the number of posts advertised as the currency of select list had expired as soon as the number of posts advertised are filled up, therefore, appointments beyond the number of posts advertised would amount to filling up future vacancies meant for direct candidates in violation of quota rules. Therefore, the appellants are not entitled to claim any relief for themselves. The question that remains for consideration is whether there is any ground for challenging the regularisation of the private respondents.