A Candidate Not Vigilant Cannot Seek Indulgence Of A Writ Court Merely On The Plea Of His Merit: Punjab & Haryana HC

A division bench of the Punjab and Haryana High Court comprising of Justice Ravi Shanker Jha and Justice Arun Palli while deciding a Letters Patent Appeal (“LPA”) in the case of Gaurav Sangwan vs State of Haryana and others has held that candidate who has not been vigilant, and has squandered the opportunity with his casual attitude cannot seek the indulgence of a writ court merely on the plea of his merit to deny other candidates, who have been meticulous and alert, access to the next stage of the selection.

Background Facts

Haryana Staff Selection Commission (“Respondent”) had invited online applications to carry out selection to 4 posts of Food Production Instructor vide advertisement No.12/2019. Gaurav Sangwan (“Appellant”) competed for selection in the General Category. He was shortlisted to fill the scrutiny form online and upload the necessary documents from 01.03.2022 to 10.03.2022. The commission gave another chance to those candidates who were not able to fill the form and upload the documents from 03.04.2022 to 05.04.2022. However, the appellant missed both the opportunities and failed to submit the necessary documents.

The appellant contended that the result of the written examination was displayed only on the Commission’s website. He did not get to know about the publication of the result as neither public notice was issued nor the information was sent to him. Therefore, he approached the Commission after the second deadline to scrutinize his documents, to enable him to participate him in the selection process. However, it was rejected since there was no provision/process to conduct scrutiny of documents over and over again.

A writ petition was filed by Gaurav Sangwan before the Punjab and Haryana High Court and Single Judge bench, which was dismissed. Aggrieved by the order, Gaurav Sangwan filed the writ appeal, called as Letters Patent Appeal to challenge the order of the Single Judge.

Findings of the Court

The court observed that the appellant submitted his application online and downloaded his admit card from the website online to appear in the written examination. It seemed incredible that he would not follow up the Commission’s website to check his result and/or the notices/instructions issued by the Commission from time to time. It said that particularly, as clause 2.3(a) of the advertisement (page 60 of the paper book), required the candidates to regularly visit the website, as no separate individual intimation would be sent. Therefore, the court held that either the appellant has been grossly negligent or, for the reasons best known to him, chose not to participate in the selection process. It observed that there was no provision to individually intimate every candidate about the result. All the participants were required to keep themselves updated with the Commission’s website. A candidate who has not been vigilant, and has squandered the opportunity with his casual attitude cannot seek the indulgence of a writ court merely on the plea of his merit to deny other candidates, who have been meticulous and alert, access to the next stage of the selection. Making such an exception, would not only endlessly stretch the recruitment process, but also put its sanctity under a cloud.

With the aforesaid observations, the Division Bench dismissed the appeal.

Case No: LPA-285-2023 (O&M)

Citation: 2023 LiveLaw (PH) 62

Case Name: Gaurav Sangwan vs State of Haryana and others

Counsel for Appellant: Adv. Yesh Paul Malik

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