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(4) In Union of India Vs. D. Sundera Rama, (1997) 4 SCC 664 the Supreme Court upheld the shortlisting of the candidates possessing higher qualification. It was held that prescribed essential qualification is minimum qualification and that mere possession of minimum qualification does not entitle a candidate to be called for interview.
(5) A large number of State and private engineering colleges are turning out thousands of graduate engineers. They are finding it difficult to get jobs. The Courts have to balance their rights to be qualified for the jobs for which a lower qualification is the essential qualification. It would not serve public interest to allow graduate engineers to remain unemployed and to offer jobs of Junior Engineer to diploma holders.
Sri Ashok Khare, Senior Counsel, argued that in a procedure for Combined Selection for several departments, the recruitment rules of each department separately specify the qualifications, with regard to some of the departments, the qualification of Diploma in Engineering is specified as "minimum qualification", while with regard to other department, diploma in Engineering is specified as "required qualification" and as the petitioners were applicants for some of the departments where the Diploma in Engineering was also specified at the "minimum qualification", a higher qualification cannot be a bar for them being considered for appointment. Sri Ashok Khare, in the alternative, submits that even with regard to the departments where the qualification is the only specified qualification even then such specification does not exclude the higher qualifications in the same stream of studies. He has relied upon the following judgements:

In the case in hand, the only qualification prescribed was "Diploma in Engineering" and it was not the minimum qualification, in fact, the State, as an employer, specifically excluded "Graduate in Engineering".

This aspect of the matter has been duly adverted to by the Hon'ble Supreme Court in Zahoor Ahmad Rather and others Vs. Sheikh Imtiyaz Ahmad and others wherein the Apex Court held as under:

27. While prescribing the qualifications for a post, the State, as employer, may legitimately bear in mind several features including the nature of the job, the aptitudes requisite for the efficient discharge of duties, the functionality of a qualification and the content of the course of studies which leads up to the acquisition of a qualification. The state is entrusted with the authority to assess the needs of its public services. Exigencies of administration, it is trite law, fall within the domain of administrative decision making. The state as a public employer may well take into account social perspectives that require the creation of job opportunities across the societal structure. All these are essentially matters of policy. Judicial review must tread warily. That is why the decision in Jyoti K.K. must be understood in the context of a specific statutory rule under which the holding of a higher qualification which presupposes the acquisition of a lower qualification was considered to be sufficient for the post. It was in the context of specific rule that the decision in Jyoti K.K. turned.

Sri Khare, in support of his submissions made earlier, has contended that in some of the statutory Rules, Diploma in Engineering is specified as the minimum qualification while with regard to some of the Departments, Diploma in Engineering is specified as required qualification. Be that as it may we have already held that Diploma in Engineering being distinct from Graduate in Engineering, no benefit flows from the advertisement whether the Diploma in Engineering is prescribed as a 'minimum qualification' or 'required qualification'.