Gauhati High Court annuls 14 District Malaria Officers' selection

The Gauhati High Court, on October 4 set aside the selection of 14 District Malaria Officers which was conducted by the Assam Public Service Commission (APSC) in 2016, stating that no appointment has been provided to any of the selected candidates since eight years.

A division bench comprising Chief Justice Vijay Bishnoi and Justice N Unni Krishnan Nair, ruled that since eight years have passed after the issuance of the select list by the APSC and no appointment has been provided to any of the selected candidates, it is deemed appropriate to set aside the selection process for the posts of District Malaria Officer.

The commission had issued an advertisement on December 15, 2012, inviting applications for filling up various posts which included 14 District Malaria Officers under the Assam Health and Family Welfare department.

Subsequently, a screening test was conducted by APSC in April 2015 and 59 candidates were declared qualified for the interview which was held in September 2015 with 14 candidates selected as District Malaria Officer and the selection process was concluded by 2016.

Meanwhile, a woman candidate who had qualified for the interview but was not finally selected filed a writ petition alleging that corrupt practices were adopted with a member of the interview board calling her and asking for money for her selection but she had refused.

The judges observed that they had carefully scrutinised the photocopies of the evaluation sheets of the 56 candidates and found that the marks of 28 of them had been altered with the original marks changed and no justification was given for the same.

"After taking into consideration the irregularities, which are of serious nature, the selection process cannot be termed as fair and transparent", the judges stated.

The Additional Advocate General submitted before the court that the state government is not in favour of protecting the selection process and has left the matter to the court to take appropriate action.

The court ruled that it is not advisable to allow APSC to conduct a fresh exercise of selection by taking into consideration the original marks obtained by the candidates who had appeared in the interview.

The judges also noted that though the selection process was concluded in 2016 but till date, no appointment has been provided to the selected candidates due to the pending writ petition.

"We deem it appropriate to set aside the entire selection process for the posts of District Malaria Officer", the judges noted.

The court further directed APSC to conduct a fresh selection process for the posts of District Malaria Officer on the available vacancies in accordance with law as expeditiously as possible.