1 FARAD CONTINUATION SHEET NO. IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY APPELLATE SIDE, BENCH AT AURANGABAD. WRIT PETITION NO.: 5230, 5231 AND 5232 OF 2011 Office Notes, Office Memoranda of Coram, appearances, Court’s orders or directions Court’s or Judge’s orders. and Registrar’s orders. WRIT PETITION NO.:5230 OF 2011 *** Trupti Vikram Andhare VERSUS The State Of Maharashtra And Anr *** Mr. Preeti Diggikar , Advocate for Petitioner Mr. V. D. Godbharle, A.G.P. for Respondent/State Authorities *** AND WRIT PETITION NO.:5231 OF 2011 *** Sudershana Sudhakar Pawar VERSUS The State Of Maharashtra And Anr *** Mr. Preeti Diggikar, Advocate for Petitioner Mr. V. D. Godbharle, A.G.P. for Respondent/State Authorities *** AND WRIT PETITION NO.:5232 OF 2011 *** Satish Ramrao Nirpane VERSUS The State Of Maharashtra *** Mr. Janakwade Shivsamb N., Advocate for Petitioner Mrs. A. V. Gondhalekar, A.G.P. for Respondent/State Authorities *** 2 FARAD CONTINUATION SHEET NO. IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY APPELLATE SIDE, BENCH AT AURANGABAD. WRIT PETITION NO.: 5230, 5231 AND 5232 OF 2011 Office Notes, Office Memoranda of Coram, appearances, Court’s orders or directions Court’s or Judge’s orders. and Registrar’s orders. CORAM: D. B. BHOSALE AND S. B. DESHMUKH, JJ. DATED: 15th JULY, 2011. JUDGMENT: [Per Deshmukh, J.]: 1. Heard learned counsel for the parties. 2. Since similar questions of law and facts have been involved in this group of writ petitions, filed under Article 226 of the Constitution of India by the petitioners we are disposing of these petitions by this common order and by consent of learned counsel appearing for respective parties. 3. Even though we are disposing of all these writ petitions, by common order, for the sake of convenience we are referring to compilation/ paper book of Writ Petition NO. 5232 of 2011. 4. There is concensus among the counsel who are present before the Court for parties, regarding issuance of advertisement. This 3 FARAD CONTINUATION SHEET NO. IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY APPELLATE SIDE, BENCH AT AURANGABAD. WRIT PETITION NO.: 5230, 5231 AND 5232 OF 2011 Office Notes, Office Memoranda of Coram, appearances, Court’s orders or directions Court’s or Judge’s orders. and Registrar’s orders. advertisement is published by Maharashtra Public Service Commission [MPSC, for short]. It bears Advertisement No.02/2010. Exhibit-F, page 27 to the writ petition is the copy of the said advertisement. Copy of this advertisement is placed on record, in all these writ petitions. Applications were invited for the post of Education Officer. From the advertisement it reveals that 74 posts of Education Officers were vacant. In this advertisement reservations have been mentioned. There is no dispute regarding reservation mentioned in the advertisement. Educational qualification is mentioned at clause No.4.3. Experience required for the post advertised is mentioned in clause 4.4 of the advertisement. With the assistance of learned counsel present before the Court we have seen these two clauses i.e. required educational qualification 4.3 and experienced mentioned in clause 4.4. According to the 4 FARAD CONTINUATION SHEET NO. IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY APPELLATE SIDE, BENCH AT AURANGABAD. WRIT PETITION NO.: 5230, 5231 AND 5232 OF 2011 Office Notes, Office Memoranda of Coram, appearances, Court’s orders or directions Court’s or Judge’s orders. and Registrar’s orders. learned counsel for the petitioners, all the petitioners are eligible for the post of Education Officer. They contend that all the petitioners have acquired necessary educational qualification and also experience. They have along with their applications submitted documents showing their educational qualification and experience. Despite this fact, petitioners, according to their contention, have received communication on E-mail from respondent informing that application of each of the petitioner for the post of Education Officer and equivalent post is rejected. Dates of receipt of such communication on E-mail may differ from case to case, however, learned counsel for all petitioners admit that their applications have been rejected by respondents and accordingly they have been informed. The Respondents have published schedule 5 FARAD CONTINUATION SHEET NO. IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY APPELLATE SIDE, BENCH AT AURANGABAD. WRIT PETITION NO.: 5230, 5231 AND 5232 OF 2011 Office Notes, Office Memoranda of Coram, appearances, Court’s orders or directions Court’s or Judge’s orders. and Registrar’s orders. of examination on official website of Respondent MPSC. There is no dispute that as per this schedule said examination will be held on 17th of July, 2011. Since petitioners applications were rejected, petitioners have challenged said rejection by filing various original applications before the learned Maharashtra Administrative Tribunal (Tribunal, for short). In Writ Petition No.5232 of 2011 such Original Application filed by the petitioner was registered as Original Application NO.436 of 2011. Learned A.G.P. who appears for Respondents admits that all petitioners accordingly have filed respective original applications before the learned Tribunal. All these original applications, after hearing the parties, have been dismissed by the learned Tribunal. 5. In Writ Petition No.5232 of 2011 Original Application No.436 of 2011 has been 6 FARAD CONTINUATION SHEET NO. IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY APPELLATE SIDE, BENCH AT AURANGABAD. WRIT PETITION NO.: 5230, 5231 AND 5232 OF 2011 Office Notes, Office Memoranda of Coram, appearances, Court’s orders or directions Court’s or Judge’s orders. and Registrar’s orders. dismissed by the judgment and order passed by the learned Tribunal on 13th July, 2011. There is no dispute that all applications have been dismissed by the learned Tribunal on same date i.e. 13th July, 2011. 6. With the assistance of learned counsel present before the Court we have gone through the order passed by the learned Tribunal. On behalf of the petitioners, it is contended that on 13th July, 2011 itself some applicants have approached and filed Original Applications before the learned Maharashtra Administrative Tribunal, Mumbai Bench, Mumbai and one of such applications, Original Application NO.597 of 2011 was filed at Mumbai and in that application interim relief has been granted by the learned Tribunal at Mumbai. Copy of that order Exhibit-M (Page 54) is placed on record. Counsel appearing for the Petitioner urged before us that facts in Original Application No.597 of 2011 filed 7 FARAD CONTINUATION SHEET NO. IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY APPELLATE SIDE, BENCH AT AURANGABAD. WRIT PETITION NO.: 5230, 5231 AND 5232 OF 2011 Office Notes, Office Memoranda of Coram, appearances, Court’s orders or directions Court’s or Judge’s orders. and Registrar’s orders. before Tribunal at Mumbai are identical to the facts of original applications filed at Aurangabad. Both the learned Tribunals i.e. Tribunal at Mumbai and Tribunal at Aurangabad have passed orders on same day i.e. 13th July, 2011. In original application No.597 of 2011 at Mumbai ad-interim relief has been granted in terms of prayer clauses 11 (a). However, Original Applications filed before the Tribunal at Aurangabad have been dismissed. According to the learned counsel for the Petitioner, dismissal of the original applications at Aurangabad is illegal and that is how those orders have been challenged in this group of writ petitions. 7. With the assistance of learned counsel present before the Court we have seen order passed by learned Tribunal at Mumbai in Original Application No.597 of 2011 in its entirety. There is no dispute amongst the parties that facts are identical in Original 8 FARAD CONTINUATION SHEET NO. IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY APPELLATE SIDE, BENCH AT AURANGABAD. WRIT PETITION NO.: 5230, 5231 AND 5232 OF 2011 Office Notes, Office Memoranda of Coram, appearances, Court’s orders or directions Court’s or Judge’s orders. and Registrar’s orders. Application No.597 of 2011 filed at Mumbai is pending and ad-interim relief is granted in favour of the petitioners therein in that original application. Resultantly, direction was issued to Respondent No.1 in that original application to immediately issue hall ticket to that applicant. Notice in that application is made returnable on 3rd August, 2011. However, original applications at Aurangabad have been dismissed finally. 8. Learned A.G.P. has drawn our attention to order passed in Original Application No. 436 of 2011. In paragraph 3 of the order, clause 5 of the advertisement is reproduced. Paragraph 4 of the order, in our opinion, is more important. There, learned Tribunal at Aurangabad, has observed that 18032 applications were received for the post of Education Officer. Those applications were scrutinised and 9798 applications have been found eligible without grant of any 9 FARAD CONTINUATION SHEET NO. IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY APPELLATE SIDE, BENCH AT AURANGABAD. WRIT PETITION NO.: 5230, 5231 AND 5232 OF 2011 Office Notes, Office Memoranda of Coram, appearances, Court’s orders or directions Court’s or Judge’s orders. and Registrar’s orders. relaxation. Further it reveals from paragraph 4 of the order passed by the learned Tribunal at Aurangabad, that the learned Tribunal has considered that only 74 posts are to be filled in and therefore the MPSC has decided to go ahead with screening test by a written examination as declared by proclamation dated 20th of May, 20-11. The learned Tribunal considered this aspect of the matter and more particularly clause 5 of the advertisement, dismissed the original applications. 9. With the assistance of learned counsel for the parties, we ourselves have considered the advertisement Exhibit-F. Clause 5 of the said advertisement is material. This clause 5 provides that in case of receipt of large number of applications in response to the advertisement it would be discretion of the MPSC to short list the candidates. Relaxation of condition is a discretion of 10 FARAD CONTINUATION SHEET NO. IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY APPELLATE SIDE, BENCH AT AURANGABAD. WRIT PETITION NO.: 5230, 5231 AND 5232 OF 2011 Office Notes, Office Memoranda of Coram, appearances, Court’s orders or directions Court’s or Judge’s orders. and Registrar’s orders. the MPSC. For short listing the candidates it is provided that the candidate holding higher educational qualification and more experience would be considered. Short listing would be carried out and limited number of candidates would be called for. In other words, candidates to be called for interview would be short listed. If MPSC decides to have a screening test educational qualification Curriculum for screening test, medium of examination of such screening test and all other details would be made available on website of the MPSC. In our opinion, clause 5 of the advertisement has given discretion to MPSC to relax educational qualification and experience and to short list the candidates. Indisputably, posts to be filled in are only 74 and large number of applications running in several thousands have been received by the MPSC. It cannot be said that petitioners have some vested legal 11 FARAD CONTINUATION SHEET NO. IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY APPELLATE SIDE, BENCH AT AURANGABAD. WRIT PETITION NO.: 5230, 5231 AND 5232 OF 2011 Office Notes, Office Memoranda of Coram, appearances, Court’s orders or directions Court’s or Judge’s orders. and Registrar’s orders. right. The learned Tribunal has properly considered the contentions raised and dismissed the original applications. Order passed by learned Tribunal at Mumbai is ad- interim order. Original Application is still pending and for this reason we are not impressed by the submission of learned counsel for the petitioners that inconsistent orders are passed by Tribunal at Mumbai and Tribunal at Aurangabad. We do not find any perversity in the order passed by the learned Tribunal in this group of writ petitions. No case for interference under Article 226 is made out. 10. Writ petitions stand dismissed. No costs. [S. B. DESHMUKH, J.] [D. B. BHOSALE, J.] Dated:15/07/2011. ans/5230