DILIP GUPTA, J. - (1.) THE petitioner who had applied as a candidate belonging to the OBC category has challenged the selections made to the post of Gram Panchayat Adhikari pursuant to the advertisement issued on 10th August, 1998.
(2.) THE respondents have filed a counter affidavit and two supplementary counter affidavits. The original records have also been examined. It transpires that at the pre-interview stage, marks were given to the candidates on the basis of the marks obtained by them at the Intermediate Examination and the Written Examination. The petitioner obtained 44.50 marks at the pre-interview stage and was placed at Serial No. 59 in the list of General Category candidates to be called for interview. This list contained the names of 64 candidates and the candidate at Serial No. 1 in the said list obtained 51.41 marks while the candidate at Serial No. 64 obtained 44.42 marks. Likewise, a list of 36 candidates belonging to the OBC category to be called for interview was also prepared. The candidate at Serial No. 1 in this list obtained 44.21 marks while the candidate at Serial No. 36 obtained 40.78 marks.
(3.) THE candidates were called for interview. The petitioner obtained 2.35 marks at the interview and thus his total marks became 46.85. 16 candidates were selected under the General Category and 9 candidates were selected under the OBC Category. The records also indicate that under the General Category, the selected candidate at Serial No. 1 obtained 58.66 marks in total and the selected candidate at Serial No. 16 obtained 53.28 marks in total. In the OBC Category, the selected candidate at Serial No. 1 obtained 52.91 marks in total while the selected candidate at Serial No. 9 obtained 50.20 marks in total.;