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11. The principal function of the Public Service Commissions is to conduct examinations for appointment to Union and State Services as provided by Article 320(1) of the Constitution. Article 320(3), inter alia, provides that the Public Service Commissions shall be consulted, (a) on all matters relating to methods of recruitment to civil services and for civil posts, and (b) on the principles to be followed in making appointments to civil services and posts and in making promotions and transfers from one service to another and on the suitability of candidates for such appointments, promotions or transfers. Proviso to Clause (3) of Article 320 empowers, inter alia, the Governor as respects services and posts in connections with the affairs of the State, to make regulations specifying the matters in which either generally, or in any particular class of case or in any particular circumstances, it shall not be necessary for a Public Service Commission to be consulted. Under Clause (5) of Article 320, such regulations made under the proviso to Clause (3) are required to be laid before the Legislature of the State. It is thus left to the State concerned to specify, by such regulations, the matters in which it shall not be necessary to consult the Public Service Commission.

13.1 The fact that there is no provision in the Constitution which makes the acceptance of the advice tendered by the P.S.C., when consulted, obligatory renders the provision of Article 320(3) directory, and not mandatory, but that does not amount to saying that it is open to the executive Government completely to ignore the existence of the Commission or to pick and choose cases in which it may or may not be consulted. The proviso to Clause (3) of Article 320 clearly envisaged framing of regulations which are to be led before the Legislature, if at all the process of consultation is to be dispensed with in matters which are to be specified. Once, such regulations have been made, they are meant to be followed in letter and spirit. It would not be open to the executive Government to bypass the process of recruitment through open competition to be held by the P.S.C. in services which fall within its purview under Article 320 of the Constitution.

14. After having the experience of working of the Government of India Act, 1935, which, in Section 266, provided for functions of the Federal and Provincial Public Service Commissions, the defects that were noticed in practice were sought to be remedied in Article 320 (embryonic form of which was Article 286 in the Constituent Assembly Debates), by seeing to it that the regulations exempting certain things from the scope and jurisdiction of the P.S.C. have to be placed before the Parliament or Legislature, as the case may be, for its scrutiny from time to time. Article 320 provides a check, and indeed a very good check, on the vagaries of the executive by providing that the regulations specifying matters in regard to which it will not be necessary to take the advice of the P.S.C., are laid before the Legislature and the Legislature will have the power not merely to criticize such regulations, but to amend them in any manner that it likes. This would ensure that no regulations would operate unless the Legislature approves them. Furthermore, by Article 323(2) of the Constitution, the State Public Service Commission has been enjoined with a duty to present annually a report of its work to the Executive and the Governor is required, on receipt of such report, to cause a copy thereof together with a memorandum explaining, as respects the cases, if. any, where the advice of the Commission was not accepted and the reasons for such non-acceptance, to be laid before the Legislature of the State, Thus, should the executive be tempted unduly to disregard the advice of the P.S.C., the representatives of the people will have an opportunity of scrutinizing such action of the executive and preventing the executive, in future, from disregarding the considered advice of the Commission. With the checks provided in these Articles, there is a reasonable certainty that the executive will be disposed to act with caution and not to exercise its powers in an arbitrary fashion and act as if the Public Service Commission did not exist.

15. It would follow from the nature of the functions of the Public Service Commission that, being associated with all matters relating to methods of recruitment to civil services and for civil posts and on the principles to be followed in making appointments, promotions and transfers, as also with the suitability of candidates for such appointments, promotions or transfers, the P.S.C. is under a constitutional obligation to exercise its powers to be consulted in all matters in which it is required to be consulted and the executive is under the constitutional obligation to consult it in all matters which are not specifically excluded by the regulations made under the proviso to Clause (3) of Article 320. Deliberate and consistent failure on the part of the executive to consult the P.S.C. in matters in which it is constitutionally obliged to consult, notwithstanding the advice may not be binding on it, would bring about a situation in which it would appear that the governance of the State is not carried on in accordance with the provisions of the Constitution, by pne hand paralysing a constitutional body like the P.S.C. from functioning and on the other, short circulating the provisions which require regulations under the proviso to Clause (3) to Article 320 to be framed and to be laid before the Legislature which can modify them, for deciding in which specified matters, consultation with the P.S.C. is to be dispensed with. The power of the Legislature in context of such regulations cannot be scuttled by the executive by going beyond the regulations which specify the matters for which it is not necessary to consult, by refraining from consultation as regards the matters not so covered by such regulations. The P.S.C. is under a Constitutional obligation to send annual report which has to be laid before the Legislature under Article 323 and in such report, it would be obligatory on its part to report about any deliberate inaction on the part of the executive Government to consult the P.S.C. in respect of the matters in which it is required to be consulted in the absence of the regulations under the proviso to Clause (3) of Article 320, and point out the fact that it could not do its work due to such inaction, deliberate or negligent or because of reckless indifference, on the part of the State Government so that the Legislature can notice the breach of the constitutional requirement of consultation from such report and take necessary action expected of it.