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(iii) The selection process is to be conducted by the university by receiving PBAS proformas from eligible Associate Professors based on seniority and three times in number of the available vacancies. In case the number of candidates available is less than three times the number of vacancies, the zone of consideration will be limited to the actual number of candidates available. The selection shall be conducted through the API scoring system with PBAS methodology and selection committee process stipulated in these Regulations for appointment of Professors. For direct recruitment of the 25% of the posts, the Rota-quota system shall be followed starting with the promotions and the direct recruitment quota shall be rotated in an alphabetical order."

(RA No.060/00003/2018)

16. Not only that, Appendix-III Table -I pertains to proposed scores for Academic Performance Indicators (API) in recruitment and CAP promotions of University/College teachers. Appendix III of Table II(A), stipulates the other conditions of promotion under CAS, which provides that a person who holding the post of Associate Professor (Stage 4) and is aspiring for the post of Professor/equivalent cadres (stage 5) is required to have API scores- 75 per year for teaching-learning evaluation related activities (category I), 15 per year for co-curricular, extension and profession related activities (Category II), 100 per year for minimum total average annual score under categories I and II, 40 per year(120/assessment period) for research and academic Contribution (Category III), along with other educational essential qualifications, as per the provisions of UGC Regulations.

17. Therefore, a co-joint and meaningful crux of the provisions of UGC Regulations would reveal that a person is eligible for promotion to the post of Professor, under CAS only, if he possesses all the requisite indicated essential qualification, and other applicable norms, scores of educational and other activities,. At the same time, the initiation of process of promotion, on the methodology of preparing the PBAS proforma on the basis of API scoring system, is a condition precedent for promotion. Besides it, the promotion to the post of Professor would depend upon variety of other relevant factors, such as seniority, availability of vacancy etc., to be calculated, as contemplated under the UGC Regulations, and not otherwise. The regulations nowhere provide that the date of promotion would be the date, when a person becomes eligible, as claimed by the applicant. On the contrary, the date of promotion has to be assigned from the date of initiation/preparation of PBAS methodology & other pointed relevant factors, and not prior thereto. The mere fact that a person has completed the requisite number of years and became eligible for a particular post on a particular date, ipso facto, is not, at all, the relevant factor, much less cogent, for assigning the date of promotion, in the instant case.

19. As a consequence thereof, and as per the past practice, the Competent Authority has rightly assigned the date of promotion as 25.09.2014, i.e. the date of initiation of recruitment process/preparation of PBAS proforma on the basis of API scoring system, to 11 eligible candidates, including the applicant (at Sr. No. 5) vide impugned order dated 09.03.2015 (Annexure A-1). If feeble and un- substantiated argument of counsel for the applicant for retrospective promotion, is accepted, then it will amount to nullifying the entire process of promotion, as contemplated under the UGC Regulations. Not only that, the applicant, (RA No.060/00003/2018) who is junior and stands at Sr. No. 5 of the list of promoted Professors, would become senior to other promoted Professors (senior professors at Sr. No. 1 to 4), at their back, which is not legally permissible.