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Laches

14. The first issue to be considered is whether the writ petitions are barred by laches. W.P. (C) No. 17478 of 2004 was filed at a stage when the results had not been declared. AIL replied to the Petitioners‟ representations dated 8th July 2003 and 9th September 2003 only on 19th September 2003. W.P. (C) No. 17478 of 2004 was filed on 3rd November 2003. It cannot, therefore, be said that the said writ petition was barred by laches.

15. As regards W.P. (C) No. 11247-50 of 2006, to begin with the results of the written test were not declared by AIL. This prompted some of the candidates to approach the Bombay High Court. Even after the selection process was completed the results were not announced. The seniority list dated 25th July 2005 does not appear to have been circulated. The Petitioners‟ letters dated 6th January 2006 and 28th February 2006 elicited a reply by AIL dated 3rd April 2006 disclosing the marks obtained by the candidates in the written test, group discussion and interview. However, the information sought at items 5 and 6 of the letters dated 6th January and 28th February 2006 was not provided. This necessitated a further reminder dated 18th April 2006 to which the AIL replied on 4th May 2006. It was only through these replies that the Petitioners learnt of the impugned seniority list dated 25th July 2005 promoting Respondents 4 to 54 as Assistant Manager (Security). The Petitioners filed the writ petition on 7th July 2006 not long after the reply dated 4th May 2006. Therefore, W.P. (C) No. 11247-50 of 2006 cannot also be stated to be barred by laches.

29. In K. Manjusree v. State of Andhra Pradesh (2008) 3 SCC 512, the exercise of selection by way of direct recruitment for the posts of District and Sessions Judges (Grade II) in Andhra Pradesh was challenged. The Administrative Committee (AC) of the High Court resolved to conduct written examination for 75 marks and interview for 25 marks. However, after the two tests were conducted a composite list was made which had marks for the written examination out of 100 and for the interview out of
25. This skewed the prescribed ratio from 3:1 to 4:1 between written examination and the interview. Therefore, a sub-committee was appointed to resolve the matter. This sub-committee did two things; one, it decided to scale down the marks for written examination, and two, prescribe a minimum percentage for passing the interview. The minimum percentage for passing the written examination was 50% for open category, 40% for Backward Classes and 35% for SC and ST, but not for the interview. The second list contained 5 out of 10 candidates recommended in the first list and 5 got eliminated as they had failed to secure the minimum marks now prescribed for the interview. K. Manjusree was one such candidate and challenged the introduction of the requirement of minimum marks in the interview after the entire selection process was completed. The Supreme held the scaling down to be proper, but struck down the introduction of the requirement for minimum marks in the interview. It explained as under: (SCC @ 526-527) "If the selection committee prescribed minimum marks only for the written examination, before the commencement of selection process, it cannot either during the selection process or after the selection process, add an additional requirement that the candidates should also secure minimum marks in the interview. What we have found to be illegal, is changing the criteria after completion of the selection process, when the entire selection proceeded on the basis that there will be no minimum marks for the interview."
"Though the Rules framed under Article 309 of the Constitution governing the selection process mandated that there would be minimum qualifying marks each for the written test and the oral interview, the cut-off mark for viva voce was not specified in the advertisement. In view of the omission, there were only two courses open. One, to carry on with the selection process and to complete it without fixing any cut-off mark for the viva voce and to prepare the select list on the basis of the aggregate of marks obtained by the candidates in the written test and the viva voce. That would have been clearly wrong and in violation of the statutory rule governing the selection. The other course was to fix the cut-off mark for the viva voce and to notify the candidates called for interview about it."
Weightage given to the written test, group discussion and interview

33. The giving of weightage to written test and interview has been the bone of contention in matters of selections both to academic institutions as well as employment under the state. In the present case, to begin with, in the Staff Notices dated 26th July 2002 and 2nd May 2003 there was no indication of there being any weightage for the written test, group discussion and interview. This was introduced through an internal note of AIL dated 8th September 2003 and never disclosed till much after the selections were made. The weightage was 70% for the group discussion and interview and 30% for the written test. This was indeed a departure from the initial criteria whereby the written test was given 100% weightage since it was made a qualifying test. A similar criteria for the post of Security Assistant Grade II in the Rajya Sabha was upheld by this Court in Mahesh Kumar v. Union of India (151) 2008 DLT 353 and affirmed by the Division Bench by judgment dated 12th March 2009 in LPA No. 346 of 2008 with the same cause title. However, in the instant case that criteria was given up for no apparent reason. As a result those who did well in the written test were eliminated if they did not do exceptionally well in the group discussion and interview. The Petitioners have placed on record details culled out from the information provided by AIL regarding the marks secured by the candidates at different stages of the selection process. Thus eight candidates who failed in English were still called for interview. Fifteen who failed in Paper III (Reasoning and Numerical Ability) were called for interview. Four who did not qualify in the written test in terms of the overall qualifying marks as per the Record Note of 16 th June 2003 were also called. Eleven candidates benefited by the marks in Paper II (English) being included whereas it was not meant to be. All this goes to show that the results could get completely distorted by changing the criteria after the selection process has begun. Further, if a disproportionate weightage is given to interview and group discussion in comparison with the written test, distortions in the results are bound to occur.