IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB & HARYANA, CHANDIGARH Date of Decision: December 13, 2010 1. Civil Writ Petition No.20994 of 2010 Vijayinder .....PETITIONER(S) VERSUS State of Punjab & others .....RESPONDENT(S) . . . 2. Civil Writ Petition No.20703 of 2010 Navpreet Kaur .....PETITIONER(S) VERSUS State of Punjab & others .....RESPONDENT(S) . . . 3. Civil Writ Petition No.21210 of 2010 Harsimranjit Kaur .....PETITIONER(S) VERSUS State of Punjab & others .....RESPONDENT(S) . . . CWP No.20994 of 2010 [2] CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE AJAI LAMBA PRESENT: - Mr. R.N. Raina, with Mr. Daman Dhir; Mr. S.K. Garg Narwana and Mr. S.S. Khaira, Advocates, for the petitioner(s). Ms. Charu Tuli, Senior Deputy Advocate General, Punjab. . . . AJAI LAMBA, J (Oral) 1. This shall dispose of three petitions viz. Civil Writ Petition No.20994 of 2010 ‘Vijayinder vs. State of Punjab & others’; Civil Writ Petition No.20703 of 2010 ‘Navpreet Kaur vs. State of Punjab & others’; and Civil Writ Petition No.21210 of 2010 ‘Harsimranjit Kaur vs. State of Punjab & others’ as they involve common questions of law and facts. 2. For facts, file of Civil Writ Petition No.20994 of 2010 ‘Vijayinder vs. State of Punjab & others’ is being taken up. 3. This civil writ petition has been filed under Article 226/227 of the Constitution of India, praying for issuance of a writ in the nature of certiorari, quashing letter/ order dated 9.11.2010 (Annexure P-4) passed by the Punjab Public Service Commission, Patiala, i.e. CWP No.20994 of 2010 [3] respondent No.3. 4. The facts of the case are that an advertisement was issued on 26.11.2009 by the Punjab Public Service Commission inviting applications from the eligible candidates for recruitment to Punjab Civil Services (Executive Branch). The petitioner being eligible applied for Punjab Civil Services Combined Competitive Examination 2009 by way of filling in Application Form. Application Form has been placed on record as Annexure P-1. 5. The Punjab Public Service Commission issued a list of ineligible candidates which was published on the official website of the Commission. Form number of the petitioner was indicated in the list of candidates as ineligible. The respondents thereafter issued a public notice through newspapers and on the official website with the following contents:- “It is for the general information of the concerned that the date of eligible & non-eligible candidates had been uploaded on the Commission’s website: www.ppsc.gov.in on 02.8.2010. If any of the candidates have any representation to make regarding their ineligibility, they may do so, in writing, to the Commission by 31.8.2010, positively, during office hours. No subsequent requests shall be considered.” 6. The petitioner filed representation dated 26.8.2010 (Annexure P-3) in response to the public notice within the time stipulated in the public notice. Vide impugned order dated CWP No.20994 of 2010 [4] 9.11.2010 (Annexure P-4), the representation has been rejected. 7. Crux of the matter is that in all the three cases that are being decided vide this order, the candidate/petitioner had not signed the declaration in the Application Form and therefore, has been shown as ineligible in the list published by the Commission. 8. Learned counsel for the petitioner (s) contend that the petitioners have not given any wrong information. The petitioner (CWP No.20994 of 2010) had filed an affidavit alongwith representation owning the contents of the Application Form and therefore, contends that the defect in filling the Application Form stands cured. The petitioners in the other two cases viz. CWP No.20703 of 2010 and CWP No.21210 of 2010, had not filed any such affidavit. 9. Learned counsel appearing for the petitioners in the three writ petitions, contend that the cases of the petitioners should be treated at par with other cases in which representations have been accepted and clerical errors have been allowed to be corrected. It has been vehemently argued that Punjab Civil Services Combined Competitive Examination 2009 Brochure itself gives the ineligibility conditions. By way of issuing public notice and giving opportunity CWP No.20994 of 2010 [5] to file representations, the respondents themselves have given a right to the petitioners to cure the defects in the Application Forms. In such circumstances, the cases cannot be segregated so as to allow correction of errors in some of the cases while not allowing the corrections in the cases of the petitioners. 10. Before proceeding further, the following needs to be extracted from the Brochure issued with the Application Form from Page 24:- “iv) Due care should be taken by the candidates to fill their application form correctly. No column should be left blank. Incomplete or wrongly filled application forms shall be summarily rejected. No representation or correspondence regarding such rejection shall be entertained under any circumstances.” 11. At page 25 of the same Brochure, ‘ineligibility conditions’ have described as follows:- “INELIGIBILITY CONDITIONS The following conditions, among others, shall render the candidates ineligible for the Preliminary Competitive Examination: a) Insufficient examination fee: (b) Examination fee deposited by means other than a crossed Bank Demand Draft; (c) Late receipt of application form; (d) Wrong/incomplete information given in application form; (e) Candidates debarred by the PPSC/ other Commissions; (f) Non-fulfilment of any of the eligibility conditions, including those of age and educational qualitifications.” CWP No.20994 of 2010 [6] 12. It has been contended on behalf of the petitioners that at Serial Nos.(d) and (f) of the above extracted portions, it has been provided that wrong/ incomplete information given in the Form or non-fulfilment of any of the eligibility conditions would constitute ineligibility. By virtue of public notice, the respondents have given a right to the petitioners/ candidates to make representation regarding their ‘ineligibility’. 13. Learned counsel contend that the cases of the petitioners are of ineligibility and therefore, no further segregation can be made and therefore, rejection of representations is illegal. 14. Learned counsel for the respondent- State has argued that in response to the public notice, 438 representations were received. On consideration of individual representations, in the context of errors in filling the Forms, 247 representations have been accepted and roll numbers have been issued. The said acceptance of representations includes 12 cases that have been dealt with separately by this Court today. 15. It has further been argued that in cases where basic information required to process a case was given, a pragmatic view has been taken and the Application Forms have been accepted. For CWP No.20994 of 2010 [7] example, where-ever some information was required to be given in two places i.e. by way of filling the code in numerical as also requiring the darkening of bubbles, however, bubbles have not been darkened, representations have been accepted. This is so because the basic information has been provided by the candidates while filling the Forms and the respondents could decipher the information and consider, and process the cases of such candidates. In certain cases, however, where information has not been given in relation to a column, Application Forms have been rejected. 16. Learned counsel for the respondent- State, in the context of the petitioners, has contended that the petitioners have not signed the declaration part and therefore have not owned the contents given in the Application Forms. In such circumstances, the cases of the petitioners cannot be accepted at par with other persons in whose context the errors were clerical in nature. 17. I have considered the contentions of learned counsel in the context of averments made in the petition, arguments and the documents to which reference has been made in Court. 18. The declaration that has not been signed by the petitioners is in Para 22 of the Application Form itself and reads as under:- CWP No.20994 of 2010 [8] “22. DECLARATION : I have read the rules and instructions carefully and have made all the entries in this form correctly. If any information given by me is later detected to be wrong at any stage the Commission is free to cancel my candidature. Date:...................... Signature of the applicant:...............” 19. Vide public notice, the persons who had been declared ineligible, have been given an opportunity to make a representation in writing to the Commission by 31.8.2010. No doubt the petitioners made representations, however, the same have been rejected for the reason that Declaration part of Application Form had not been signed by the petitioners. The contents of the declaration itself make it evident that the candidate was required to sign in lieu of acceptance of the entries made in the Application Form. 20. It thus follows that if all the entries have been made in the Application Form, however, the applicant has not affixed his signatures in lieu of the fact that the entries have been made giving correct information, the entries in the Form would not bind the applicant for consequences that might follow for giving wrong information. Without taking responsibility as to the correctness of entries by way of signing the Declaration, the entries themselves would come to naught. The Declaration is CWP No.20994 of 2010 [9] something like verification clause in an affidavit. Thus, I am of the considered opinion that it was imperative for the candidate to sign the Declaration part of the Form to certify that the information has been correctly given to the Punjab Public Service Commission for being considered for selection in Punjab Civil Services (Executive Branch). The non-signing of the Declaration is fatal in nature and therefore, I find no fault with the decision taken by the respondents in rejecting the representation of the petitioner. 21. The cases whose representations have been accepted, are by and large those cases wherein the error was in not filling the bubbles. Information was given by way of filling the column in regard to the same information by filling the code in numerical. In certain other cases, information was required at two places, however, at one place the information had been provided by the candidates, thus, the respondents were made aware of the status of the candidates and therefore, their Application Forms were accepted. 22. The contention of learned counsel for the petitioners is also required to be considered in the context of the service which the petitioners want to join i.e. Punjab Civil CWP No.20994 of 2010 [10] Services (Executive Branch) wherein the basic element is required in the candidates. A person applying for Punjab Civil Services (Executive Branch) is required to have a certain level of acumen, alertness and understanding. The Application Form itself is accompanied by Brochure. The Brochure is a detailed document and has been made only so as to help the candidates in filling the Form. Considering the totality of facts and circumstances, I am of the opinion that even equity does not come to the aid of the petitioner. In case the Declaration itself is not signed, it cannot be accepted as a mere error. 23. In regard to the ineligibility conditions to which the attention of the Court has been drawn, as extracted above, I am of the view that although Form provided the ineligibility conditions however, the respondents are within the bounds of their power to reject a representation in case the defect in filling the Form is fatal in nature. While the Forms of other candidates with minor errors could be considered, in the case of petitioner(s), they would have to be called to the office of Punjab Public Service Commission to sign the Declaration clause. There has to be a terminus to every process. If all defects are allowed to be cured, the process would take infinite time in satisfying all the CWP No.20994 of 2010 [11] candidates who have committed errors. 24. In my opinion, it was required for the respondents to consider representation(s) of the petitioner(s) in a relevant context, objectively. I am of the view that respondents have done the exercise in a positive way, therefore, no reason for judicially reviewing the action of the respondents on the administrative side is made out. The petitioners were expected to fill the Application Form(s) correctly. Admittedly, it was an error committed by the petitioner(s) in not signing the Declaration. The respondents gave an opportunity to represent so that the issue could be re-considered. The respondents have re-considered the issue and have found the error committed by the petitioner(s) to be fatal in nature thereby rendering the petitioner(s) ineligible to take preliminary examination for selection to Punjab Civil Services (Executive Branch). In such circumstances, I find that the petitioners do not have any substantive right to invoke extraordinary writ jurisdiction. The argument addressed on behalf of the petitioner(s) that the publication of public notice gives a right to the petitioner(s) for correcting the errors, cannot be accepted to mean that any and every defect in filling the Application Form would be corrected CWP No.20994 of 2010 [12] by the candidates. Surely, the respondents have the discretion, which in my opinion has been exercised objectively, to reject the representations in case the defect in filling the Application Form(s) is of serious nature. 25. No ground for interference in extraordinary writ jurisdiction is made out. 26. The petition is dismissed. (AJAI LAMBA) December 13, 2010 JUDGE avin 1. To be referred to the Reporters or not? 2. Whether the judgment should be reported in the Digest?