NEW DELHI — The Supreme Court on Thursday struck down the Karnataka Civil Services (Validation of Selection and Appointment of 2011 Batch Gazetted Probationers) Act, 2022, holding the law unconstitutional and ruling that the appointments made under it “will also come to an end”, Bar and Bench reported.
Source: Bar and Bench
A Bench of Justices JB Pardiwala and K Vinod Chandran held that the State legislature could not overturn the cancellation of the 2011 recruitment after that cancellation had been upheld by the Karnataka High Court and by the Supreme Court itself. “The cancellation having been upheld by the High Court and the Supreme Court, the power does not lie with the legislature to annul the cancellation, even by a legislation, and thus nullify the judgments of the Constitutional courts,” Justice Chandran said, according to The Hindu BusinessLine.
Source: The Hindu BusinessLine
A recruitment hanging fire since 2011
The dispute began with a notification dated November 3, 2011, for recruitment to 362 Group A and B posts through the Karnataka Public Service Commission. A CID inquiry found gross manipulation, corruption and nepotism: candidates were found to have communicated with commission members, identical interview marks were awarded without objective individual assessment, and a digital video recorder was replaced to destroy evidence, Bar and Bench reported. The State cancelled the entire recruitment; the Karnataka Administrative Tribunal initially quashed the cancellation, but the High Court restored it, and an attempt to resume the process from the written-examination stage also failed over irregularities in the evaluation of answer scripts.
More than a decade later, the Karnataka legislature enacted the 2022 Act to revive the selection. Under it, 191 candidates received appointments — including 14 whom the CID had found tainted. A public interest litigation challenging the law was dismissed by the High Court in 2022, and unsuccessful candidates carried the fight to the Supreme Court in appeals filed by Srinivasa T and others.
What the Court directed
Declining to order fresh recruitment under the old rules, the Court directed the Karnataka government to notify the vacant Group A and B posts in accordance with the existing recruitment rules. As one-time relief, untainted candidates appointed under the 2022 Act, the six appellants before the Court and the petitioners before the Karnataka Administrative Tribunal will get age relaxation to appear in the fresh process, The Hindu BusinessLine reported.
Source: The Hindu BusinessLine
If any of them are selected afresh, their seniority will count only from the date of the fresh appointment, with no back wages or notional appointment from an earlier date. LiveLaw's report of the judgment adds that, if persons now in service are selected again, the period they worked under the earlier appointment will be reckoned for pension and retirement benefits.
Source: LiveLaw
The Bench also recorded “a little bit of surprise and a lot more alarm” at the High Court's handling of the challenges to the Act, saying the PIL was cursorily dealt with and the later writ petition was decided “throwing to winds every tenet of law”. It criticised the State's shifting positions over the years: “When the winds of politics change direction, it is the common man, who gets caught in the storm.” Senior Advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for Karnataka, conceded that the legislation could not be supported, Bar and Bench reported.
The judgment draws a line for every State government: a legislature may change a law to remove the basis of a court decision, but it cannot enact a law that simply annuls a final judgment. That distinction will govern future attempts anywhere in India to revive recruitments or selections that courts have cancelled.
With the 2022 Act struck down, the 191 appointees lose its protection, and the Karnataka government is now expected to notify the vacant posts under the existing rules — finally closing, one way or the other, a recruitment that began fifteen years ago.