Document Fragment View

Matching Fragments

(4) According to the appellants/University, the orders of cancellation of selection have been passed by the Vice- Chancellor of Dr. Shakuntala Mishra National Rehabilitation University, Lucknow primarily for the reason that in the meeting of the General Body of the University, an enquiry was instituted against the previous Vice-Chancellor Dr Nishith Rai and all the charges against him were proved and he was found guilty of administrative and financial irregularities. As a consequence of that, the appellants/University after seeking legal opinion, decided that all the appointments made during Dr. Nishith Rai's tenure would be enquired on a case-to-case basis. It seems thereafter the Executive Committee of the University had appointed a three-member Committee, which has submitted its report, where it has been found that the appointments of the private respondents were made without following the rules of qualification, reservation etc. and most importantly, no approval was sought from the Visitor for appointment of the panel of experts and that these people were appointed despite the fact that they did not have the requisite qualification, experience, API score etc. which was contrary to the rules on the date of their selection.

(47) Similarly, it is available from the records that as far as the case of Vipin Kumar Pandey (Special Appeal No. 335/2023) is concerned, the learned Single Judge has dealt with the said aspect of essential qualification at paragraph No 68 of the impugned judgment. This Court finds that the controversy with Vipin Kumar Pandey was that he had applied for the post of Assistant Professor (English) and the only ground on which the services of the selection of the petitioner was cancelled is that while offering his candidature details given in regard to API score indicated that he did not have score of 300 as prescribed under the UGC Regulations. The allegation was that the writ petitioner claimed API score of 304.5 points under category III by awarding 50 points in category III sec IIIE (i) whereas a maximum of 30 points can be claimed under that section, and hence the petitioner came down to 284.5 which is less than the minimum required API score as per the stand of the university. This court finds that the Ld. Single Judge after dealing with the concept and calculation of API as applicable in the present case, returned a finding as follows:

(48) The only ground taken by the appellants/University in the appeals seeking interdiction of the aforesaid judgment is that the writ petitioner did not append the documents to get the minimum API score of 300 points on the last date of submission of application form on 22/03/2014 nor did the said writ petitioner could produce any documentary evidence to prove that any document/publication had been produced before the selection committee to get the minimum API score of 300 points. This Court finds that at serial No.21 of the general Instruction issued by the university it was specifically provided that final decision in regard to eligibility of the candidate shall be that of the appointing authority/ administration of the university and the same shall be binding on the candidates. Further, it has been specifically averred by the writ petitioner in his petition that while appearing before the selection committee, he submitted his additional API score together with evidences in the prescribed format and claimed 40 additional points which were not claimed by him while submitting his application form and as such he claimed the fulfilment of minimum score of 300 points. It had also been contended in the writ petition that the selection committee after being fully satisfied with the API score as also the educational qualification and other requisite conditions selected and appointed him as associate professor in English and also attached the said requisite document as annexure 8 to the writ petition. This Court finds that there is no contrary averment to the said factual matrix of the writ petitioner. Thus, this Court besides being in absolute agreement with the observation of the learned Single judge also conclude that the writ petitioner had the requisite API on the date of selection and as such the learned Single Judge has rightly held that he fulfilled all the qualifications and found the decision of the Appellant/University to be arbitrary, illegal and liable to be set-aside.

(55) As regards the other deficiency pointed out, this Court notes that the learned Single Judge also returned a clear and reasoned finding that the research papers authored by Avanish Chandra Mishra, which have been accepted for publication were required to be considered, which although were duly taken into account by the Selection Committee but arbitrarily not considered by the inquiry committee and consequently there was no infirmity/deficiency in the qualification of the petitioner. Even the API score was wrongly calculated as Avanish Chandra Mishra possessed 469.5 API marks and the said score was calculated as per the UGC Regulation, 2010 as could be also found in the writ petition itself annexed along with the present Appeal. This court finds that besides repeating the same ground in the present Appeal, there are no new grounds which have been agitated by the Appellant/university in the present Appeal. Very recently the Constitution Bench of the Apex Court in a recent Judgment dated 12.07.2023 reported in 2023 SCC Online SC 994 in Re: Sivanandan C.T and others V/s High court of Kerala and Ors., which was a matter relating to selection of Judicial officer in the state of Kerala, the Apex Court in the said judgment although held that the procedure adopted was arbitrary for selections but refused to unseat these candidates on the ground of public interest, who had been working for more than 06 years. This Court finds that the said Avanish Chandra Mishra had been working for more than 08 years and there had been no complaint relating to his inefficiency, nor there is any allegation of fraud or misrepresentation on his part. Thus, this Court is not inclined to disturb and unsettle the findings already arrived by the learned Single Judge.