New Delhi, Oct 29 (PTI) The Supreme Court on Thursday struck down as unconstitutional a Karnataka law that sought to validate appointments arising from the state’s tainted 2011 recruitment of gazetted probationers.
Holding that the legislature cannot override judicial decisions that had already upheld the cancellation of the selection process, a bench of Justices J B Pardiwala and K Vinod Chandran allowed appeals challenging the Karnataka Civil Services (Validation of Selection and Appointment of 2011 Batch Gazetted Probationers) Act, 2022, under which appointments had been made despite earlier findings of widespread corruption and nepotism in the recruitment process.
“We have no doubt in our minds that the subject legislation is unconstitutional. We set aside the same, as also the judgments impugned herein, both in the PIL and the writ petition filed against the order of the KAT (Karnataka Administrative Tribunal). The PIL, though not agitated by the individual who filed it, would stand allowed, transposing the appellants herein as the petitioners,” the judgment said.
The court also directed the Karnataka government to initiate fresh recruitment against the vacancies that remain in Group A and Group B services under the existing recruitment rules.
It also ordered a one-time age relaxation for specified categories of candidates, including the six appellants, eligible candidates from the earlier selection and petitioners in pending proceedings before the KAT.
“Having found the Act of 2022 unconstitutional, we cannot but observe that the appointments made pursuant to the tainted recruitment will also come to an end. The passage of a decade and a half from the initial recruitment restrains us from resuming the entire selection from the stage at which it was found tainted; i.e., after the stage of the preliminary examination,” it said.
Moulding the relief, the bench directed the state government to notify the recruitment for the vacant posts.
“Insofar as the persons who are continuing now, if selected, their seniority shall also be only from the date of their fresh appointment as per the selection and recruitment directed by us. However, if the persons working now get selected and appointed, the period they have been in service pursuant to their earlier appointment shall be reckoned for computation of their pension and retirement benefits,” it said.
The recruitment, notified on November 3, 2011, was intended to fill 362 posts. Of the 1,38,307 candidates who applied, 91,667 appeared for the preliminary examination, 6,211 qualified for the main examination and 1,090 were called for interviews.
The state government withheld the publication of the final selection list in 2013 after complaints of irregularities prompted an investigation by the Criminal Investigation Department (CID).
The investigation revealed serious manipulation of the recruitment process, including corruption and nepotism involving officials of the Karnataka Public Service Commission (KPSC).
The government subsequently cancelled the recruitment. The Karnataka High Court, and later the Supreme Court, upheld the cancellation.
In earlier proceedings, courts took note of evidence including call records linking candidates with KPSC members, identical interview marks awarded to numerous candidates and the replacement of a digital video recorder at the Commission’s premises, which raised concerns about destruction of evidence.
The courts also rejected the argument that candidates allegedly untainted by the irregularities could be separated from those implicated, holding that the integrity of the selection process as a whole had been compromised.
More than a decade later, Karnataka enacted the 2022 law to validate the selection and appointments, citing the hardship faced by candidates who were not themselves accused of wrongdoing.
The legislation effectively sought to undo the cancellation that had already been upheld by the constitutional courts.
Writing the judgment, Justice Chandran observed that the recruitment had been invalidated not merely because of procedural defects but because rampant corruption and blatant nepotism had tainted the entire process.
