Gopal Krishan Vyas, J. - (1.) In this writ petition, the petitioner has prayed for the relief that the respondents may be directed to place him at a merit position higher than that of respondent No. 3 and offer appointment to the petitioner as per his preferences for the post.
(2.) According to the facts narrated by the petitioner, being eligible to compete for the Rajasthan State and Subordinate Services, he applied for the competitive examination in pursuance of the advertisement dt. 06.04.2003. The said notification was published in the Employment News dt. 15.04.2003. In all, 493 vacancies were advertised for which applications were called from the eligible candidates for direct recruitment to the Rajasthan State and Subordinate Services. According to the petitioner, he is science graduate and, being as such eligible as per his qualification, he applied to appear at the said examination conducted by the Rajasthan Public Service Commission.
(3.) Aforesaid combined competitive examination was conducted as per the scheme under the Rajasthan State and Subordinate Services (Direct Recruitment by Combined Competitive Examination) Rules, 1999 (in short, to be called hereinafter as "the Rules of 1999"). According to the petitioner, as per Rule 4 of the Rules of 1999, it is provided that the combined competitive examination is to be conducted by the Commission and the said examination, under the scheme, consists of three -tier selection process i.e., Preliminary Examination, Main Examination and viva voce. The candidate is required to obtain certain percentage of marks in the Preliminary Examination to become eligible for appearing at the Main Examination. That is, however, for the purpose of shortlisting only and marks obtained at the preliminary examination are not taken into consideration for determining the final order of merit. As per Rule 15, in the Main Examination candidates 15 times in number of the number of vacancies to be filled up in the year in the various services are allowed to appear. Candidate who obtains such qualifying marks in the Main Examination as may be fixed by the Commission shall be entitled to be called for the interview and marks so awarded at the interview are to be added in the marks obtained at the Main Examination. In that way, the final merit list is to be prepared for recruitment to various services.;