HC reserves verdict on selection of assembly staff

PATNA; TNN, Sep 30, 2010;

The Patna high court on Wednesday reserved its verdict on two writ petitions challenging the mode of selection of 89 Class III employees in the Bihar legislative assembly in 2004 on the basis of an advertisement issued for the posts in 2001.

A single bench presided by Justice VN Sinha reserved the judgment after hearing the writ petitions of Rajiv Ranjan Singh and Alok Dwivedi who have challenged the selections on the basis of a written test and interview while the advertisement did not mention about any interview.

Justice Sinha also heard the selected candidates who pleaded that the HC had in 2005 dismissed the writ petitions of some unsuccessful candidates challenging the action of the state assembly in holding interview to select 89 candidates.

On Wednesday, petitioners' counsel Bindhyachal Singh alleged malpractices by a Select Committee of the state legislative assembly which had interviewed 2,544 candidates for the 89 posts which were advertised with the criteria that selection would be made on the basis of written test only. The advertisement did not mention about the process of interview. Moreover, the Select Committee had called 25 times the number of candidates against the 89 posts which was contrary to the Supreme Court ruling for taking interview of three to five times the number of posts, he submitted. He added that the marks fixed for interview was 25% of the marks obatained at written test not 12.5% as per a Supreme Court ruling.

The petitioners' counsel referred to some documents supplied by the assembly under provisions of Right to Information Act and alleged that the marks obtained in written test by 29 candidates had been reduced.

Appearing for the selected candidates (respondents), their counsel Rajendra Prasad Singh, Abhay Kumar Singh, Basant Kumar Chaudhary and Rakesh Kumar Samarendra submitted that the Patna high court had in 2005 dismissed a writ petition challenging the process of selection of the 89 Class III emplopyees of legislative assembly.

Rajendra Prasad Singh submitted that the high court had upheld the selection process in which interview was taken after the written test. Singh added that in an inquiry, the vigilance department had found that the documents provided to the petitioners under RTI ACt showing change in marks of 29 candidates, seemed to be fake as they did not match the tabulation register.