K. Kannan, J. - (1.) THE Petitioner, who was an applicant for allotment of dealership in LPG Gas with Hindustan Petroleum Corporation, challenges the allotment ultimately made to the third Respondent. The contention of the Petitioner was that in terms of advertisement issued on 02.02.2004 and the priorities mentioned as regards the choice of persons, the Petitioner as the dependent son of a member of the Armed Forces, who died -in -harness, was entitled to be considered ahead of the claims of the third Respondent, who fell below his rank as a person who claimed as a dependent of a defence personnel. Responding to the Petitioner's challenge, the first Respondent -Corporation gave out the reason that the Petitioner had been awarded less marks in the interview after consideration of all the relevant data supplied in the application and the criteria applied for awarding such marks in terms of the guidelines already issued for selection of retail outlet dealership. It was also contended that the Petitioner was not found suitable for selection since he did not have any proof of availability of property while the third Respondent had definite documentary evidence for the same. The third Respondent, who is the ultimate beneficiary had, apart from affirming the contentions of the Corporation, also contended that the interview had been concluded and notified in August, 2004 and the third Respondent had actually taken a property on lease paying rent @ Rs. 2,000/ -per month and put up a construction at a cost of Rs. 10,00,000/ -. At the time when the petition was filed, letter of intent had already been issued and the outlet had also become operational. The Petitioner was guilty of laches and he cannot, therefore, have any right. According to third Respondent, the Petitioner also did not have the requisite qualification as dependent son of an Army Personnel since the Petitioner was about 45 years of age and was supporting his college -going children at the time of application, while on the other hand, the third Respondent was just about 23 years and his dependency on his father cannot be doubted.
(2.) THE learned Counsel appearing for the Petitioner placed at the forefront of his arguments, among candidates belonging to defence personnel category, the order of priority mentioned in the advertisement was: b) Defence Personnel Category (DC): Defence Personnel means personnel of armed forces (viz. Army, Navy, Airforce) and will cover widows/ dependents of those who died in war, war disabled/ disabled on duty, widows/ dependent of those members of Armed Forces who died in harness due to attributable causes and disabled in peace due to attributable causes. Candidate belonging to this category should be sponsored by Director General of Resettlement, Ministry of Defence, GOI. Following is inter -se priority for DC category (i) Widows/ dependents of posthumous gallantry award winner. (ii) War widows/ dependents of those who dies in war. (iii) War disabled/ disabled on duty. (iv) Widows/ dependents of those who dies in harness due to attributable causes. (v) Disabled in peace due to attributable causes. Certificate of Eligibility issued for one particular distributorship is not valid for another distributorship. According to him, the Petitioner was the son of a war veteran, who died while serving in the Indian Army during the 1971 Indo -Pak war and he was entitled to be considered favourably to the exclusion of any other candidate. If the issue was only with reference to inter se preference then, I have No. doubt in my mind that the Petitioner was entitled to be awarded the dealership. It must be noticed that the advertisement sets out several parameters and the issue of inter se priority would apply only if the candidates tied at the same place in terms of relative merits. In this case, admittedly, there were only two candidates that stood for consideration finally when yet another applicant by name Kulwant Kaur, had not turned up in the interview and fell out of the zone of reckoning. The contention of the learned Counsel Mr. Bhan appearing for the Petitioner that when he was found suitable then, there was No. scope for taking the candidature of the third Respondent.
(3.) THE interpretation as contended by the Petitioner is also untenable because it makes irrelevant the several other criteria laid down for selection, which cannot be the objective of spelling out inter se preference. As we have seen above, if the Petitioner was ahead in terms of the status as a dependent of the Army Personnel that died -in -harness, such a consideration could have been taken only after taking note of all relevant criteria set through the advertisement. The learned Counsel argued that assignment of marks for various information elicited in the application was introducing a new criterion, which was not set forth in the advertisement. The learned Counsel refers to a decision of this Court in "Dr. (Mrs.) Sangeeta v. State of Punjab and Ors., 2010 (4) SCT 465" states that a change of criteria after advertisement is not permissible. In the above case, while dealing with the selection and appointment to the posts of Ayurvedic Medical Officer, this Court held that new criteria arbitrarily framed after advertisement to suit the 'favourite candidates' were bad in law.;