Doli vs State Of U.P. And 2 Others
2021 Latest Caselaw 4909 ALL

HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT ALLAHABAD
 
 

AFR
 
RESERVED
 
Court No. - 40
 

 
Case :- SPECIAL APPEAL DEFECTIVE No. - 226 of 2021
 

 
Appellant :- Doli
 
Respondent :- State Of U.P. And 2 Others
 
Counsel for Appellant :- Ram Kishun Misra,Jai Singh Yadav
 
Counsel for Respondent :- C.S.C.
 

 
Hon'ble Manoj Misra,J.

Hon'ble Rohit Ranjan Agarwal,J.

(Delivered by Hon'ble Manoj Misra, J.)

1. This intra court appeal arises from a judgment and order of a Single Judge, dated 23.09.2020, in Writ-A No.7159 of 2020 by which though the writ petition of the appellant has been partly allowed but the prayer to allow correction in the entry relating to marks obtained by her in the Intermediate Examination filled in her form, submitted online, for Assistant Teacher Recruitment Examination, 2019, has been denied.

2. A glimpse at the facts giving rise to the appeal would be apposite. The State Government issued a notification to fill up 69,000 posts of Assistant Teacher in primary schools in various districts of the State. To that end, an Assistant Teacher Recruitment Examination, 2019 (for short ARTE, 2019) was proposed to be conducted by the Examination Regulatory Authority, Prayagraj (for short Authority). The appellant applied online with Registration No.130002862 and was assigned Roll No.12133720438. In the examination that followed, on 12.05.2020 the appellant was declared qualified. After declaration of result, U.P. Basic Shiksha Parishad (for short Parishad) invited online applications from successful candidates for counselling and appointment. The petitioner applied by feeding her registration number which reflected the data already filled by her earlier while getting registered for the ARTE, 2019. On such online submission, as per her merit, she was allotted district Shahjahanpur. Appellant's case is that when she discovered that in her online submission two entries were incorrect, namely, total marks of her graduation course, which were shown as 1300 in place of 1350, and marks obtained in Intermediate Examination, which were shown as 289 in place of 287 marks, she made representation to the Secretary, Authority and the Secretary, Parishad. When no action was taken on her representations, she filed Writ A No.7159 of 2020 before a Single Judge Bench of this Court, which was partly allowed by the impugned judgment and order to the extent correction was sought in the grand total of graduation marks.

3. Before the learned Single Judge a decision of the Apex Court in the case of Archana Chauhan versus State of UP & others (Civil appeal No.3068 of 2020, arising out of SLP (Civil) No.9541 of 2020, dated 2.9.2020) was cited by which the Apex Court allowed rectification of a mistake committed by a candidate, who had appeared in ARTE, 2019, in filling the total marks of all the papers of the Intermediate examination passed by the candidate. In that case, the candidate had secured certain marks against a total of 500 marks but, by mistake, this total was entered as 5000. The Apex Court upon finding that the erroneous entry of which correction was sought had been to the candidate's detriment, and that the candidate had not taken any advantage of that error, allowed rectification. The learned Single Judge following the judgment of the Apex Court allowed rectification to the extent prayed for in the total marks of the graduation course, that is the learned Single Judge allowed increase in the total marks of the graduation course from 1300 to 1350. But the learned Single Judge refused correction in the entry of marks alleged to have been obtained in the Intermediate Examination on the ground that the disclosed marks were higher than what the candidate actually obtained and, therefore, it had a bearing on the selection process. While rejecting that prayer, the learned Single Judge noticed clause 17 of the Government notification, which instructed the candidate to cross check the data fed from the testimonials, and to obtain a printout of that data, before uploading. Sub-clauses (5) and (6) of clause 17, specifically warned the candidate that after the data is uploaded, no correction/ alteration would be allowed under any circumstances.

4. We have heard learned counsel for the appellant and the learned standing counsel for the respondents and have perused the records.

5. The learned counsel for the petitioner submitted that reduction of the marks obtained would come to the detriment of the appellant therefore, applying the principle deducible from the decision of the Apex Court in Archana Chauhan's case (supra), correction ought to be allowed and, under the circumstances, there is no justification to deny an opportunity to the appellant to correct an obvious human error. He further submitted that admittedly the appellant had qualified the written examination and for appointment she would have had to show her testimonials therefore correction, to make the marks in sync with her testimonials, would cause no prejudice to the other participating candidates.

6. Per contra, the learned standing counsel submitted that the instructions in the notification had put the candidate on notice that any mistake would not be allowed to be corrected and, therefore, the instructions had warned that before feeding the data a cross check of the data with the testimonials be made. Under the circumstances, no mandamus ought to be issued to the authorities to deviate from their avowed policy decision which applies universally to all candidates. He also submitted that the Apex Court has not laid down as a law that all errors arising out of human error be allowed to be corrected even if a candidate is put to notice that he will not be allowed to correct mistake once the data is uploaded. He also cited a decision of a Division Bench of this Court in Special Appeal No.834 of 2013 (Ram Manohar Yadav v. State of U.P. & others, decided on 30.05.2013).

7. We have given our anxious consideration to the rival submissions. Before we proceed to weigh the respective submissions, it would be useful to notice the decision of this Court in Special Appeal No.834 of 2013 (Ram Manohar Yadav v. State of U.P. & others, decided on 30.05.2013). In that case, the appellant, who had applied for selection on the post of a teacher, had not filled the online application form correctly. He, therefore, applied for rectification of the mistake, which was not accepted. Thereafter, he filed a writ petition which was dismissed by a Single Judge Bench of this Court. Aggrieved therewith, he filed Special Appeal before a Division Bench of this Court. While dismissing the appeal, the Division Bench observed: "if prospective teacher can not even correctly fill up the simple on line application form for his employment, it is obvious what he is going to teach, if appointed. There are certain decisions cited on this issue. But none of them deal with this aspect whether under the discretionary jurisdiction of the Court under article 226 of the Constitution of India such incompetent persons should be allowed to play with the future of the next generation." In a different context, the above decision of this Court was noticed with approval by another Division Bench of this Court in Special Appeal Defective No.117 of 2014 (Km. Richa Pandey v. Examination Regulatory Authority and another, decided on 18.02.2014). There the petitioner had not filled the column of language in which she had attempted answers in the OMR answer sheet. The learned Single Judge found that in absence of mention of language in which the answers were attempted, OMR sheet would not be acceptable for evaluation and, therefore, the writ petition is liable to be dismissed. The Division Bench, on appeal, called for the records and found that there were clear instructions that if requisite columns are not filled correctly, the answers will not be evaluated. Thus, while affirming the decision of the learned Single Judge, the Division Bench observed:

"The OMR sheets are provided to the candidates to speed up evaluation through help of computer. In case we accept the argument of learned counsel for the petitioner that the language in which the petitioner had written essay could be checked up by the examiner before feeding answer book into computer, the entire process of expediting the results will be lost. Where OMR sheets are to be examined with the aid of the computer, it is not advisable and practical to direct that each OMR sheet should be checked by the examiners and the columns, which have not been filled up may be filled up by the examiner himself with the aid of the language used by the candidates for writing essay. We are informed by Standing Counsel that about seven lacs candidates had appeared in the test.

With such large number of candidates appearing in TET Examination 2013 it would not have been possible nor it was feasible for examiners to look into the answer sheets individually before feeding them into computer for correcting any mistakes.

We agree with the reasoning given by the learned Single Judge that where the applicant is not capable of correctly filling up the form, she is not entitled to any discretionary relief from the Court."

(Emphasis Supplied)

8. Having noticed the two Division Bench decisions of this Court, the issue which arises for our consideration is whether a candidate who is put to notice that before uploading the data she must cross check the data with her testimonials and obtain a print-out thereof before uploading and, once it is uploaded, she would not be allowed to correct a mistake, could seek a writ of mandamus upon the authorities to allow her to correct the mistake. The answer to it would depend upon existence of enabling provisions found in a statute or rule or executive instructions. No statutory provision or rule or instruction has been shown to us which may allow such correction despite clear instructions to the contrary in the notification. It has also not been shown to us that the authorities have allowed such corrections to other candidates. It is well settled that a mandamus is ordinarily to be issued upon a public authority to perform its duty or obligation cast upon it by law. A person seeking a writ of mandamus must therefore demonstrate that a right inheres in him that casts a corresponding duty / obligation upon the public authority or State or its instrumentality to perform, or desist from performing, such act for which a writ of mandamus is sought. That right may be derived, inter alia, from the Constitution of India, a statute or a rule or an executive instruction. The petitioner has failed to demonstrate that any such right inheres in her under a Statute or rule or executive instructions. Whether such right inheres in her under the Constitution of India needs to be examined. Interestingly, the petitioner has not challenged the instructions contained in clause 17 of the notification as violative of Part III of the Constitution of India or any statutory provision or rule. Otherwise also, in matters relating to public examinations, such strict instructions as are found in clause 17 of the notification are desirable to prevent foul play and to ensure expeditious conclusion of the recruitment process, inasmuch as if candidates are allowed to correct/alter data their merit position would alter accordingly, resulting in utter confusion. Therefore, ex facie, such instructions do not appear arbitrary. In these circumstances, we are of the considered view, the appellant has failed to make out a case for issuance of a writ in the nature of mandamus commanding the respondents to rectify the mistake made by her in her online submission.

9. The decision of the Apex Court in Archana Chauhan's case (supra) does not lay down as a law that all rectifications of any nature must be allowed. Moreover, in Archana Chauhan's case (supra), the information of which correction was allowed was not in respect of the marks obtained by a candidate but was in respect of an obvious error of adding a zero to the total marks for which the candidate had appeared in the Intermediate examination. Thus, in our considered view, the learned Single Judge rightly observed that the second correction sought would not be covered by the decision in Archana Chauhan's case. For all the reasons mentioned above, we find no good ground to interfere with the judgment and order passed by the learned Single Judge. The appeal is dismissed.

Order Date :- 08.4.2021

Sunil Kr Tiwari