Civil Writ Petition No. 7386 of 2009 -1- IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Civil Writ Petition No. 7386 of 2009 DATE OF DECISION: MAY 5 , 2011 Ambika Chaudhary .....Petitioner VERSUS Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd. & others ....Respondents CORAM:- HON'BLE MR.JUSTICE RANJIT SINGH PRESENT: Mr. Deepak Sibal, Advocate, for the petitioner. Mr. Raman Sharma, Advocate, for respondent Nos.1 & 2. Mr. Akshay Bhan, Advocate, for respondent No. 3. **** RANJIT SINGH, J. This order will dispose of two writ petition Nos. 7386 of 2009 and 22346 of 2010. The petitioner as well as respondent No.3 was applicant for LPG Distributorship at Piyala, Distt. Faridabad. Advertisement for allotment of dealership for this place was issued on 9.11.2007 by Bharat Petroleum Corporation. The eligibility and the instructions governing filing of application, were duly mentioned in the advertisement. Reference is made to Clause 14.1 of the advertisement, which provides that gross family income of the last Civil Writ Petition No. 7386 of 2009 -2- financial year has to be clearly specified while making application for LPG distributorship. The format in this regard was also provided, copy of which has been annexed with the petition as Annexure B. Reference is also made to general instructions given in the advertisement for making such application. The brochure containing detailed procedure, method and criteria for selection of LPG Distributors, is available on internet. Copy of the same has also been appended with the writ petition. As per this brochure, marks are to be allotted under different heads. So far as criteria of income is concerned, it is provided that there will be maximum of 5 marks for income and for every unit of ` 10,000/-, 0.1 marks would be awarded. Thus, 1 mark was to be awarded for ` 1 lacs. The petitioner, thus, would claim 2.5 marks for ` 2.50 lacs income shown by him. The petitioner, in fact, had declared his gross family income as `2,53,730/-. The petitioner as well as respondent No.3 were interviewed. The result was declared on 17.2.2009. The petitioner felt aggrieved against the assessment made by the respondents. As per the petitioner, he was awarded 1.5 marks under the head of income, whereas she would be entitled to 2.5 marks. The petitioner claims that difference between the merit of the petitioner and respondent No.3, who was selected, being microscopic in nature, this additional mark would make a substantiate purpose. As per the record, respondent No.3 had secured 92.67 marks, whereas the petitioner was given 91.67 marks. The petitioner has pleaded that on totaling the Civil Writ Petition No. 7386 of 2009 -3- marks awarded to respondent No.3 under different heads, she noticed that respondent No.3 had secured 92.66 marks and not 92.67 marks. If one mark, which was wrongly denied to the petitioner is added in her total, then she would secure 92.67 marks, whereas marks of respondent No.3 would work out to be 92.66. Accordingly, the petitioner claims that she would more meritorious as compared to respondent No.3. During the pendency of this writ petition, respondent No.3 also approached this Court through CWP No.22346 of 2010. Respondent No.3 perhaps had thought of filing this writ petition the margin between her and the petitioner being very negligible. Respondent No.3 in her writ petition would impugn assessment and award of marks to the petitioner and some grievance about the marks awarded to her. The said writ petition was ordered to be heard with the writ petition filed by the petitioner. Separate replies are filed on behalf of respondent Nos.1 & 2 as well as respondent No.3. It is conceded that while totaling the marks of respondent No.3, the calculator has taken higher digit of .00 mark i.e. .06 has been taken as .07. The total marks, therefore, as obtained by respondent no.3 has been shown as 92.67. Respondent No.3 otherwise would point out that even if her total is taken to be as 92.66, it would not make any difference in the selection as total marks secured by the petitioner would still be less than her. Respondent nos.1 & 2 would deny the allegation that the evaluation of the petitioner has not been done rightly. It is stated that evaluation of all the candidates was done on the basis of Civil Writ Petition No. 7386 of 2009 -4- documents annexed with the application form. I have heard counsel for the parties. The difference between respective merits having been done on the basis of evaluation is very negligible. Minor error either in calculation or in evaluation can lead to unfair result. I am conscious of the fact that the scope of judicial review is limited in such like matters. It would not be appropriate for this Court to consider the documents annexed with the application and re-assess the evaluation done by the Committee constituted by respondent Nos.1 & 2. However, there seems to be an error apparent on the face of record in the calculation. Both the parties are aggrieved not only against their respective merit as evaluated, but also against the evaluation of the merits of each other. The petitioner would maintain that she was entitled to one more mark and thus, would rank more meritorious than respondent No.3, whereas respondent No.3 has grievance that evaluation of the petitioner is not properly done and if that happens and further, if the evaluation of respondent is also done as per the document then there would not be any major change in the result. To be fair to the counsel for the parties, both have raised different limbs of submissions to challenge their respective assessments made by respondent Nos.1 & 2 and so also the evaluation in assessment of each other. It would not be appropriate for this Court to carry out the exercise of revaluation. In fact, respondent Nos.1 & 2 and the Committee constituted would be in a best position to re-apply themselves to the documents and the Civil Writ Petition No. 7386 of 2009 -5- material that has been placed on record by both the parties. Since the difference is so negligible that minor error would lead to unfair result, it would be appropriate to issue direction that both the parties be given liberty to raise all the pleas either before the Committee, which is constituted or the Committee which has now to carry out the test of re-evaluation of the respective merits. It is made clear that both the parties would be at liberty to make their submissions on the basis of the documents already on record. None of the parties would be allowed to rely upon any additional material or document and only those documents and material that is already available on record, would be taken into consideration. The Committee or the team now detailed for carrying out the evaluation, therefore, would be at liberty to award marks in accordance with laid down criteria and then publish the result. Needless to mention that the aggrieved parties would be at liberty to avail the remedy in accordance with law. Let this exercise be done within a period of 3 months form the date of receipt of certified copy of this order. Both the writ petitions are disposed of in view of above observations. May 05, 2011 (RANJIT SINGH) monika JUDGE