RAKESH KUMAR Vs. STATE OF HARYANA & OTHERS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Government Public Relation and Cultural Affairs Department, Haryana invited applications for 25 posts of Assistant Public Relation Officers on 18.11.2007. A Committee was constituted to conduct the interviews of the candidates. The petitioner, being eligible and qualified, submitted his application and appeared for interview on 9.12.2007. 226 candidates had applied and appeared before the Committee, out of which 32 candidates were selected for the post of Assistant Public Relation Officer. The grievance of the petitioner is that the selection was not done on the basis of merit and the eligibility criteria was also ignored. It is also stated that the appointment of respondent Nos.3 to 34 was made due to some extraneous considerations. The petitioner accordingly has filed this writ petition to challenge the selection and appointment of the private respondents.

(2.) One of the grounds, which was advanced by the counsel for the petitioner when notice of motion was issued, was that the persons appointed did not fulfill the criteria of experience.

(3.) In response to notice, reply has been filed. Mr.Rathee would refer to the reply filed by Additional Director-II, Information and Public Relations Department on behalf of respondent Nos.1 & 2. It is stated in the reply that because of unreasonable nature of the experience as prescribed, the requirement of experience was relaxed after taking approval from the State Government. The reasons given in this regard are that at the time of registration, it was noticed by the Committee that the experience certificates attached by the candidates were not as per the requirement of the department. The requirement of experience as given in the advertisement was for a candidate to have one year experience in a Publicity Organisation of Union or State Government on a post of comparable responsibility or one year experience as full time correspondent or an Editor or Sub Editor of weekly newspaper or whole time correspondent in a news agency. No honorary or part time experience was to be counted. In this background, it was noticed that the correspondents working in the news agencies would not come to apply for a post on contract basis and that too when it was initially advertised for a period of six months only. It is stated that a person working on regular basis would not be interested to leave the regular job and apply for a job on contract basis. Since the candidates did not fulfill the condition of experience, more particularly, the whole time experience in a newspaper having requisite circulation, it was decided on the spot to register the candidates, who fulfill the conditions of academic/professional qualifications, subject to Government approval regarding relaxation of experience. The condition of experience for engagement of ADPROs on contract basis was relaxed by the Government on 11.3.2008 and thereafter the persons were engaged on the basis of their merit as per the performance in the interview and the marks obtained in the selection criteria.