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The petitioner alleged that while filling her form for the preliminary exam, by mistake, she applied under the DFF category though she belongs to the EWS category and it was only after qualifying the pre-exam, she realised her mistake.
The Allahabad High Court on Monday, as an interim measure, permitted a candidate to appear in UP Judicial Service Civil Judge (Junior Division) Mains Examination which is to be held from today onwards.
The bench of Justices Rajendra Kumar and Saumitra Dayal Singh, however, clarified that the permission has been granted as an interim measure only and the final result of the petitioner would not be declared except the leave of the court.
The court passed the order in the plea moved by one Pankhudi Agarwal who alleged that while filling up the form for preliminary examination for the UP Judicial Service Civil Judge (Junior Division), she, by mistake, applied as 'Dependent of Freedom Fighter'(DFF) though she belongs to Economically Weaker Section (EWS) category.
The petitioner submitted that it was only after qualifying the preliminary examination, she realised her mistake and tried to fill up the form for the Mains exam as an EWS category candidate.
The petitioner claimed that by way of an application for correction of the reservation category, she approached the Uttar Pradesh Public Service Commission which is conducting the said examination, however, her candidature was rejected in accordance with Clause 11(18) of the notification for the examination by the commission for furnishing false/misleading information.
The petitioner's counsel Advocate Prabhav Srivastava argued before the division bench that it was not the case that the petitioner had made any false or misleading claim since she was not claiming the benefit of reservation under the DFF category, instead, it was a case of a bona fide mistake.
He submitted that the intimation towards the bona fide mistake was already given to the commission much prior to the rejection order passed by the Commission.
It is to be noted that Advertisement no. A- 5/E-1/2022 was published by the Commission inviting applications from eligible candidates for filling up 303 vacant posts of Civil Judge (Junior Division). As per Note 6 of Clause 7 pertaining to reservation under the notification, in case a candidate is unable to produce relevant certificates along with the Main (Written) Examination, the claim of reservation would not be entertained.
During the course of the hearing on Monday, the court asked the counsel for the Commission, Adv MN Singh to produce the result of the preliminary examination concerning the petitioner.
When the result was placed before the court, it noted that in the pre-exam, the petitioner had obtained more than the cut-off marks under the EWS category.
Therefore, while noting that prima-facie the matter requires serious consideration, but in view of the urgency of the matter, court, as an interim measure, directed the Commission to allow the petitioner to appear in the examination provisionally.
Further, court granted two weeks time to the counsel for the Commission to file a counter affidavit.
Furthermore, the court expressed that it expects that the pleadings in the matter would be completed in the first week of July 2023.
The matter will be next heard on July 10, 2023.
Case Title: Pankhudi Agarwal v. State Of U.P. And 2 Others
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