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Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited & Anr. vs Sandeep Choudhary & Ors.

Civil Appeal · 2022 INSC 489Decided 28 Apr 2022
Civil Appeal No. 8717 of 2015
M.R. Shah · B.V. Nagarathna

Background

BSNL advertised posts of Telecom Technical Assistants in the Ajmer Secondary Switching Area, with a qualifying cutoff of 40% for general (unreserved) category candidates and 33% for reserved category candidates. After the first round of exam results, BSNL relaxed the cutoffs (to 30% and 23% respectively) because too few candidates had qualified. Once relaxed, it turned out two OBC-category candidates (Alok Kumar Yadav and Dinesh Kumar) had scored higher marks than the lowest-ranked appointed general category candidates, yet BSNL still appointed them under the OBC quota rather than shifting them into the general category pool, which meant the respondent, an OBC wait-listed candidate with lower marks, was left out even though a vacancy should have opened up for him in the reserved category once the two higher-scoring OBC candidates were moved to the general pool.

Decision Breakdown

The Supreme Court, applying settled law from Indra Sawhney, Rajesh Kumar Daria, R.K. Sabharwal, Saurav Yadav, and Sadhana Singh Dangi, held that reserved category candidates who score higher than the last general category candidate selected must be treated as having been selected on their own merit and placed in the general/unreserved category, not counted against the reserved quota: this keeps the true reservation quota intact and available in addition to open merit selections. Since Alok Kumar Yadav and Dinesh Kumar were more meritorious than the general category candidates actually appointed, they should have been shifted to the general category, freeing up their reserved-category seats for the next-most-meritorious OBC candidates, including the respondent. However, because two already-appointed general category candidates had been working for a long time, the Court used its special constitutional power under Article 142 to avoid removing them from service, instead directing that the respondent be appointed now to a reserved category seat with seniority backdated to when the lower-merit general category candidates were originally appointed. BSNL's appeal was dismissed.

Lesson Learnt

When a reserved-category candidate scores higher than the cut-off used to select general category candidates, that candidate must be counted in the general/unreserved pool rather than against the reservation quota, doing otherwise unfairly denies opportunities to other reserved-category candidates who were next in line on merit.

Official source (sci.gov.in)View Judgment (PDF)

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