Supreme Court Favours Public Service Commission Arunachal Pradesh on "Pro-Rata Marks" Row.

While hearing the Arunachal Pradesh Public Service Commission & Another vs. Miss Hage Mamung & Others case, the Supreme Court quashed the High Court’s order to re-evaluate the papers of the Original writ petitioner and another candidate given to Arunachal Pradesh Public Service Commission. The writ petition filed by the original petitioner was dismissed by the Single Judge which was further restored by the Supreme Court bench.

 Public Service Commission issued an advertisement for filling up 22 Agriculture Development Officer posts. Different candidates including the original petitioner applied for the said post and successfully cleared the written examination as well as called for the viva-voce test. When the Public Service Commission published the result by shortlisting 22 candidates, the name of the original writ petitioner was not on the said list.The original writ petitioner further filed one RTI application and was furnished the answer sheet and statement of marks. As per the information furnished, the original writ petitioner got 268.45 marks in the written examination and one of the candidate was awarded 268.75 marks. It appeared that the answer keys with respect to question No.12 and question No. 31 were found to be wrong and therefore it was decided by the Public Service Commission to cancel the said question Nos. 12 & 31. Also, marks were given to the candidates for those questions on a pro-rata basis.

The original writ petitioner thereafter filed a writ petition before the learned Single Judge of the High Court contending that she gave correct answers to both the questions, namely, question Nos. 12 & 31 which was not the case with other few candidates. The learned Single Judge dismissed the said writ petition. However, by the impugned judgment and order, the Division Bench of the High Court allowed the writ appeal and quashed the judgment and order passed by the learned Single Judge. Feeling aggrieved and dissatisfied with the impugned judgment and order passed by the Division Bench of the High Court ordering re-evaluation of the papers of the original petitioner and another candidate, the Public Service Commission preferred the present appeal. 

The bench comprising Justices M.R. Shah and C.T. Ravikumar held that “the Division Bench of the High Court is not justified in ordering re-evaluation of the papers of only two candidates against a conscious decision taken by the Public Service Commission to award two marks to each candidate on pro-rata basis with respect to two questions of which the answer keys were found to be wrong” The top Court further highlighted that the examination paper itself was wrong and thus could not possibly be evaluated to have the correct answer, there may be deletion of such incorrect questions and the consequent pro-rata distribution of the marks allocated to them.