Srinagar: In the “controversy” arising out of the selection of 34 draftsmen in the Public Works Department (PWD), the J&K High Court today directed the government to take a final decision in terms of Rule 13 of the Recruitment Rules of 1997, within a month.
Justices Moksha Khajuria Kazmi and Rajnesh Oswal directed the J&K UT government “to settle the controversy once and for all, within a period of one month thereafter.”
The court also made it clear that “till the final decision of the government, in compliance to the observations made by the court, no selection/appointment to the post of Draftsman shall be carried out by the respondents.”
The direction was passed in the case titled Wasim Shafi & others versus UT of J&K, wherein the petitioners challenged and sought quashment of the judgment and order passed by the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) Srinagar on June 30, 2022.
Matrix of the case is that an advertisement notification was issued on October 24, 2020, by the Recruit Board for filling up 34 posts of Draftsman (Civil), PWD (R&B) UT Cadre. The petitioners offered their candidature for the post.
In terms of the eligibility criterion, a candidate had to possess two years Draftsman Training Course Certificate/Diploma in Civil Engineering from Govt. recognized Institute.
This advertisement was followed by a corrigendum in November 2021 whereby the eligibility criterion was modified and the word ‘Civil’ appearing in the earlier eligibility criteria was removed.
The eligibility thus prescribed for the posts in question was modified as “2 years Draftsman training course certificate/diploma from any government recognized institute.”
The respondent authorities issued the result of the computer-based test for the posts in December 2021, wherein the petitioners were shown to have scored between 95 to 99 points.
Subsequent thereto the candidates figuring in the result notification were called for document verification. As the petitioners had applied and participated in the selection process against more than one advertised post, they were asked to indicate their preferential choice of post.
However, subsequently, a provisional select-list came to be issued by the respondents for the post of Draftsman (Civil), PW (R&B) UT cadre on February 23, 2022, excluding the petitioners.
Aggrieved of their exclusion, the petitioners filed representations against the provisional select-list seeking its redraw. The representation was rejected by the respondents.
Feeling aggrieved of their non-selection and the rejection of their representations, the petitioners filed an OA No. 226/2022 before the Tribunal titled Wasim Shafi v. Public Works Department (R&B).
The Tribunal however dismissed the OA saying “we find that the qualification prescribed for recruitment to the post of Draftsman (Civil) has been correctly mentioned in the corrigendum and that it is based upon the Rules prescribed under SRO 180 of 1997 dated 26.5.1997”.
It said the “applicants who are in possession of Diploma in Civil Engineering are not eligible to be considered for the post of Draftsman (Civil).”
The aggrieved candidates approached the court saying that no reasoning was assigned by the CAT for dismissing their OA and that its judgment is contrary to the Recruitment Rules of 1997.
The division bench after hearing the respondents and the petitioners directed the government “to constitute a team of experts for examining the minimum qualification prescribed for the post of draftsman in terms of Recruitment Rules of 1997, with respect to its term and field of diploma of the candidates, in its right perspective”.
It ordered that the committee to be constituted by respondent authorities should examine and clarify the intent of the Rule making authority in inclusion of three-year diploma holders for the 10 percent quota prescribed for the post of Junior Engineers Grade II as per Recruitment Rules of 1997.
The Committee has been accordingly directed to submit its recommendations after obtaining consensus of the experts to the government within a one month from the date of passing of today’s order.
