Guwahati: The Gauhati High Court has ruled that in the absence of clear and proper guidelines for recruitment documents, a job applicant cannot be denied appointment. The ruling was made by a single-judge bench while deciding a writ petition related to the recruitment of Junior Engineers (Civil) under the Panchayat and Rural Development (P&RD) Department in Assam.
The case revolves around an advertisement published on June 24, 2020, to fill 344 posts of Junior Engineer (Civil) in the P&RD Department, with 33 of those posts reserved for candidates under the Economically Weaker Section (EWS) category.
The petitioners, belonging to the EWS category, claimed they were selected based on their performance but were denied appointments. They alleged that candidates with lower marks in the final selection list were appointed instead.
The petitioners had submitted EWS certificates to claim the reserved posts but argued that there was ambiguity regarding the format and requirements for these certificates, as the EWS reservation was introduced only in 2019 through the 103rd Constitutional Amendment.
The court observed that the recruitment advertisement required candidates to produce valid EWS certificates issued for the 2019-2020 financial year but did not specify a format. The petitioners’ certificates, though dated within the financial year, were issued mid-year, leading to their rejection.
The court noted that since the EWS concept was new and no certificate format was provided until a 2022 advertisement, rejecting the petitioners’ certificates was unreasonable. The court ruled in favor of the petitioners, directing that they be appointed as Junior Engineers in the P&RD Department. The ruling was limited to the specific circumstances of the case, given the nascent stage of the EWS concept at the time.
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