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32. The question of large number of candidates appearing for the selection process again came up before this Court in Joginder Singh and others v. Roshan Lal and others [(2002) 9 SCC 765]. A complaint was made in this case that 323 candidates appeared for the test in two days and on that basis a select list was prepared by the Departmental Promotion Committee. The High Court called this selection process as a farce on the ground that fair chance was never given to the candidates to show their worth. The Court observed in para 5 as under:

"On the facts on record we see no justification for the High Court to have come to this conclusion. The High Court in exercise of its jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution is not supposed to act as an Appellate Authority over the decision of the Departmental Selection Committee. If the Committee has been properly constituted, as in this case, and the post is advertised and a selection process known to law which is fair to all, is followed then the High Court could have no jurisdiction to go into a question whether the Department Selection Committee conducted the test properly or not when there is no allegation of malafides or bias against any member of the Committee. Merely because there were a large number of candidates who appeared on two days, cannot ipso facto lead to the conclusion that the process of selection was a farce and fair chance was not given. Normally experienced persons are appointed as members of the Selection Committee and how much time should be spent with a candidate would vary from person to person. Merely because only two days were spent in conducting the interviews for the selection of Class IV posts cannot lead to the conclusion that the process of selection was not proper."

44. It is settled law that in such writ petitions a roving inquiry on the factual aspect is not permissible. The High Court not only engaged itself into a non permitted fact finding exercise but also went on to rely on the findings of the Amicus Curaie, or as the case may be, the Scrutiny Team, which in our opinion was inappropriate. While testing the fairness of the selection process wherein thousands of candidates were involved, the High Court should have been slow in relying upon such microscopic findings. It was not for the High Court to place itself into a position of a fact finding commission, that too, more particularly at the instance of those petitioners who were unsuccessful candidates. The High Court should, therefore, have restricted itself to the pleadings in the writ petition and the say of the respondents. Unfortunately, the High Court took it upon itself the task of substituting itself for the Selection Committee and also in the process assumed the role of an Appellate Tribunal which was, in our opinion, not proper. Thus, the High Court converted this writ petition into a public interest litigation without any justification.