HC slams staff selection panel for harassment, imposes Rs 3 L costs

Rapping the State for illegal action and dragging a police force aspirant into avoidable litigation for the last six years, the Punjab and Haryana High Court has imposed Rs 3 lakh exemplary costs on the Haryana Staff Selection Commission (HSSC).

“The commission is bent upon victimising the petitioner by hook or crook and/or made it as a prestige issue to dislodge her claim by all means,” Justice Mahabir Singh Sindhu asserted. The admonition came on a petition filed against the State of Haryana and other respondents by Karishma, who had applied for the post of female constable (general duty). The court said the respondents’ stand in the matter, in its opinion, was illegal, arbitrary, discriminatory and, as such, unacceptable.

Justice Sindhu said: “The irresistible conclusion would be that respondent-commission rejected the petitioner’s lawful claim without any justification and was determined to harass the poor lady, who belongs to ESM-SC category. The petitioner, at her own, is maintaining two minor children and fighting for the last six years. Hence, there is no hesitation to observe that objection raised by the commission is totally frivolous and indefensible in law; hence, deserves to be deprecated in strongest words”.

He observed that the commission initially rejected her candidature for not fulfilling the height criteria. But three different sources confirmed her height was “over and above the minimum requirement”. The respondents did not raise any objection that a unique identity number did not belong to her, she was overage or did not apply in terms of the advertisement, but were trying to dislodge her claim on flimsy ground.

Justice Sindhu said the petitioner cleared all three steps –– knowledge test, physical screening test and physical measurement test for selection to the post. “But now at this belated stage, the commission has rejected her candidature on the premise that she was overage on the cut-off date, i.e. April 1, 2018, which in the opinion of this court is wholly illegal,” the Bench stated.

Justice Sindhu added power for relaxation, including age limit, vested with the government. The commission should have referred the petitioner’s matter to the government, even in the worst-case scenario, rather than rejecting it outright on the ground of being overage.

Allowing the petition filed through counsel Lalit Rishi, Aman Godara and Rohit Singh, Justice Sindhu quashed physical measurement test report before directing the respondents to treat her fully eligible and duly qualified for the post in accordance with her merit.