IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Civil Writ Petition No.6779 of 2009 (O&M) Date of decision:03.05.2010 Shama Goyal ….Petitioner versus Haryana Vidyut Prasaran Nigam Limited and others …Respondents CORAM: HON’BLE MR. JUSTICE K. KANNAN ------ Present: Mr. Ashwani Talwar, Advocate, for the petitioner. Mr. Mohnish Sharma, Advocate, for Mr.Narender Hooda, Advocate, for respondents 1 to 4 Mr. Parveen Kumar Garg, Advocate, for respondents 5, 6, 8 and 9. ----- 1. Whether reporters of local papers may be allowed to see the judgment? 2. To be referred to the reporters or not? 3. Whether the judgment should be reported in the digest? ----- K.Kannan, J (Oral) 1. The challenge in the petition is to the selection of the petitioner as an Account Officer in the respondent-Haryana Vidyut Prasaran Nigam Limited. The rejection of the candidature of the petitioner was on account of the fact that the petitioner was reported not to have fulfilled the essential qualification set down in the advertisement. The essential qualification issued in the advertisement dated 27.12.2006 reads as under:- “2. Essential qualification: i) The candidate should be a Chartered Accountant or Civil Writ Petition No.6779 of 2009 (O&M) - 2 - MBA with Specialization in Financial Management with 2 years experience in the Supervisory Capacity after passing CA/MBA Examination. OR ii) M.Com 50% marks and ICWA with 4 years experience in supervisory capacity after passing the M.Com/ICWA Examination. iii) Must have passed Hindi upto Matric Standard.” 2. Clause 3 of the advertisement stipulated an age limit to be reckoned as on 31.12.2006 and the last date for the application as prescribed was 30.01.2007. The petitioner's claim was that he had two years of experience in supervisory capacity, if the period were to be reckoned upto 30.01.2007, being the last date of application. The petitioner's claim was rejected only on the ground of reckoning of number of years of experience that was made from the date of advertisement namely on 27.12.2006. 3. The learned counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioner refers to the fact that even the interview letter dated 31.03.2008 issued to him mentioned in note 9 only as follows:- “9. If at any stage, it is detected that candidate does not fulfill the requisite qualifications prescribed for the post as on 30.1.2007 or is ineligible on any other ground, this interview letter will be withdrawn and his/her candidature will be cancelled.” (emphasis mine). 4. If the requisite qualification for the post was to be determined on 30.01.2007, unquestionably the petitioner had two years of experience. It shall not be permissible for the employer to contend that the reckoning must be taken only from the date of advertisement or Civil Writ Petition No.6779 of 2009 (O&M) - 3 - the date which had been prescribed for the age limit. Evidently, the essential qualification itself does not contain the specific details as to the outer limit for the computation of the period of two years of experience. When the respondents had chosen to send the interview letter and that had provided for the date which corresponded to the last date of receipt of application, then it should only be that date mentioned as the last date of receipt namely on 30.01.2007 that shall be the criterion for determining the number of years of experience. 5. The petitioner shall therefore be found to be fit for being selected to the post and the writ petition shall be allowed. This decision shall have no bearing on the appointment of the private respondents, who are arrayed as parties before this Court as respondents 5 to 8. I am informed that two of the persons, who had been appointed, have since resigned and that there are vacant posts and that the petitioner can be adjusted against the vacant post. The petitioner shall be deemed to have been appointed on the date when others were served with the appointment letters for the purpose of seniority only, but it shall not avail to him any monetary benefit for the said period. 6. The writ petition is allowed. No costs. (K.KANNAN) JUDGE 03.05.2010 sanjeev