P&H High Court Rejects 'Negative Fee Waiver', Says Candidates Can't Be Made Ineligible For Paying Application Fee Despite Exemption

The Punjab and Haryana High Court has set aside the Haryana Staff Selection Commission's rejection of three TGT (Sanskrit) candidates who were denied the benefit of promised age relaxation solely because they had, out of caution, paid the application fee despite being expressly exempted from it.

Holding that a candidate cannot be penalised for such an act of diligence, Justice Harpreet Singh Brar said,

"It seems that the respondent-Commission needs a gentle reminder that it is not an ordinary fee-collecting agency but bears the responsibility to conduct merit-based recruitment to public service in a manner that is fair and non-arbitrary. Thus, its focus should not be on whether or not application fee has been submitted in spite of an exemption but to determine if the prescribed criteria is satisfied. Moreover, when the State has categorically preserved eligibility of a certain set of candidates, it does not stand to reason as to why a mere technological oversight should deprive otherwise eligible aspirants from consideration."

However, this is precisely what has occurred, the Court remarked. Considering that these are not the corridors of the Red Keep where one can proclaim, “Power is power” and act on one's whims and fancies, but a constitutional democracy governed by Rule of Law, this Court cannot in good conscience overlook the act and conduct of a public recruiting authority in penalizing a candidate for foregoing a benefit granted to him, it added.

The Haryana Staff Selection Commission had attempted to recruit TGT (Sanskrit) teachers since 2016, but two successive advertisements (2016 and 2019) were cancelled. When a fresh advertisement (No.2 of 2023) was issued, Clause 11 specifically provided that candidates who had applied against the cancelled 2019 advertisement would be granted relaxation in age, HTET (Haryana Teaching Eligibility Test) eligibility, and exemption from the application fee provided they applied afresh with proof of their earlier fee payment.

The petitioners, having previously applied and been allotted unique IDs recognising their earlier candidature, applied again under the 2023 advertisement and cleared the written exam, scoring higher than the last selected candidates.

Despite this, they were excluded from the final result on the ground of being overage — the Commission's stated reason being that since the petitioners had paid the nominal application fee (₹150/₹75) instead of availing the fee exemption under Clause 11, they could not claim the accompanying age relaxation either.

The petitioners contended that the online portal had no drop-down option to indicate their exempted status, and they had paid the fee purely as a precautionary measure given the troubled history of this recruitment.

Counsel for the petitioners argued that Clause 11 clearly preserved their eligibility, including age relaxation, regardless of the fee exemption; that the Commission itself had allotted them unique IDs recognising their status as candidates from the cancelled advertisement; that the portal's own design left them no way to indicate exemption; and that they could not be penalised for paying a fee the Commission itself accepted.

The Commission argued that having paid the fee meant to be waived, the petitioners forfeited their claim to the accompanying age relaxation, and that since they were admittedly over the prescribed age limit of 42 years as fresh applicants, their exclusion was justified.

Justice Brar, framed the central question as "whether a candidate can be denied the concession of relaxation in age... merely for not availing the additional concession of exemption from payment of the application fee."

Court remarked that the Commission had taken a bizarre stance— The Doctrine of Negative Fee Waiver— that essentially stipulates that if the fee is waived and you pay it anyway, you are ineligible. It remarked:

"Of all the reasons to deny consideration to a candidate, certainly, being meticulous ought to be the most tragic... The metamorphosis of diligence into disqualification is a rather cruel irony, not lost upon this Court."

The Court noted that the Commission itself admitted, through an affidavit, that unique IDs were generated exclusively for candidates found eligible on account of their earlier applications under the cancelled advertisements, meaning the portal already possessed the information needed to identify the petitioners as exempted candidates.

It held that since the portal accepted their applications despite their being technically overage under Clause 6, this could only be explained by the relaxation under Clause 11 having been applied — making the subsequent rejection on the same ground of age internally inconsistent.

The Court was critical of the Commission's admission that its portal was "neither designed nor programmed" to reconcile a candidate's relaxation claim with fee payment, holding:

"Digitization in itself does not render a process efficient... it appears that the respondent-Commission has modernized the application process in namesake only."

The Court held that the Commission, as a public recruiting authority, was obligated to conduct merit-based recruitment fairly rather than fixate on technical fee compliance, and that a "mere technological oversight" could not be allowed to deprive otherwise eligible, meritorious candidates of consideration, invoking the doctrine of res ipsa loquitur given that the Commission had allotted unique IDs, accepted the applications despite the age issue, and received the fee, only to later reject the candidates on the very ground its own conduct had implicitly waived.

Allowing all three connected petitions, the Court set aside the impugned result and corrigendum dated 27.07.2024 to the extent they excluded the petitioners from selection for TGT (Sanskrit);

It directed the Commission to consider the petitioners' candidature strictly on merit, subject to fulfilment of other eligibility conditions and further directed the competent authority to pass appropriate orders within two months.

The bench held that the petitioners entitled to consequential and notional benefits from the date their batch-mates joined, though actual monetary benefits (salary etc.) would accrue only from their respective actual dates of joining.

Title: Nirmala Devi and others v. State of Haryana and others (with connected CWP-25356-2024 and CWP-1432-2025)

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