HISTORIC JUDGMENT

High Court quashes entire selection of Veterinary Surgeons

Early Times campaign against PSC’s fraudulent process vindicated

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz

SRINAGAR, May 1: Chief Minister Omar Abdullah remained in a denial mode with his dismissive Tweet on day one of the Early Times series and Governor, Narendra Nath Vohra, did not make the autonomous Jammu & Kashmir Public Service (PSC) accountable on the oath administered to its members, in the last three months. Jammu & Kashmir High Court, however, restored the faith of hundreds of thousands of the state’s students and job aspirants in the state’s democratic institutions when it summarily quashed entire process of PSC’s selection of 55 Veterinary Assistant Surgeons (VASs) the other day in Srinagar.

PSC had issued the selection list on February 17^th, 2011. As scores of highly meritorious candidates found that almost all of them had been dropped and candidates of poor performance had been instead picked up from the tail-end of the merit shortlist, they submitted a detailed representation to Chief Minister, explaining, therein, how merit had been brazenly marred and the PSC selectors, according to them, had stooped to unprecedented unfair means---including interviewing and selecting their own relatives.

With nobody listening to the aggrieved candidates and most of the media organizations refusing to take cudgels with the PSC, these candidates approached Early Times---state’s only newspaper that does not survive on government advertisements. This newspaper singularly investigated and documented a slew of irregularities that had been practiced during the selection process and, accordingly, published a series of stories with the objective of enforcing reforms in the selection process.

PSC thankfully amended two of the key rules, curtailing the marks reserved for viva voce but still did not make it at par with the competitive selections processes conducted by UPSC and other selection agencies. It maintained that no irregularity had been practiced and claimed that the selection of VASs had been conducted in a clean and transparent manner.

Rather than reviewing the process objectively and in a judicious manner, the PSC Secretary characteristically threatened to silence this newspaper with “legal action”. The aggrieved candidates also approached State Vigilance Organisation (SVO) and Crime Branch and beseeched these executive organs to launch an investigation into the charges---including money transactions through RTGS---leveled by them. As both of the government organizations kept the ball tossing on each other, the candidates filed a petition in the Court of Special Judge Anti-Corruption, Srinagar, who directed SVO to carry on the investigation.

With no action being visible at SVO--- now sarcastically known as an organisation to round up Patwaris and clerks--- the aggrieved candidates approached J&K High Court with the prayer that the entire selection process be quashed and PSC be directed to hold the exercise afresh. On its first hearing on February 23^rd, Mr Justice Hasnain Masoodi stayed the selection and directed Chief Secretary, Commissioner-Secretary General Administration Department (GAD) and Commissioner-Secretary Animal and Sheep Husbandry not to issue any order of formal recruitment of the selected candidates till subsequent hearing.

After two months of arguments and counter-arguments, Mr Justice Hakeem Imtiyaz Hussain on Friday quashed the entire selection list and issued orders to the PSC as prayed for by the petitioners. Former Advocate General and senior Advocate, Altaf H Naik, represented the petitioners in the High Court. The court terminated the selection for a variety of irregularities, particularly the PSC’s unjustified act of combining the 30 vacancies of two independent departments---Animal Husbandry (15) and Sheep Husbandry (15)---so as to invite 210 candidates instead of 105 only in accordance to the rule in vogue.

PSC members, Khizar Mohammad Wani and Dr H L Goswami, conducted the selection process alongwith the subject expert from Andhra Pradesh, Dr Hafeez. They were assisted by PSC’s Secretary and Controller of Examinations, Mohammad Ashraf Bukhari. While as just 30 marks, out of 100, were reserved for academic merit, 50 marks were reserved for the interview, never recorded for proof of fairness. Out of remaining 20, as many as 15 marks remained nearly at the sweet will of the selectors. As against 50% in this infamous selection, not more than 15% marks are reserved for interview in most of the selection processes in the state and the country---KAS and IAS both inclusive.

It was pointed out by the complainants that most of the high merit and highly qualified candidates, who figured from serial No: 1 to 50 of the merit shortlist and who included top position holders and gold medalists of SKUAST-K, SKUAST-J had been dropped and those figuring beyond S No: 50 and 100, had been selected. Those dropped included all 35 of the state’s most brilliant veterinary graduates and post-graduates who had been selected earlier for the more prestigious and more competitive Kashmir Administrative Service (KAS) on February 7^th by the same PSC.

After termination of the appointment of Dr Sheikh Jalal as Director of the prestigious Sher-e-Kashmir Institute of Medical Sciences by Justice Imtiyaz Hussain in 2007, Friday’s termination of the PSC’s selection is being widely appreciated as a historic judgment across the state of Jammu and Kashmir. This is for the first time in the last several years that PSC’s selection list has been summarily dismissed by the High Court, raising question marks on the competence, impartiality and integrity of the selectors.

Early Times received hundreds of appreciation messages through e-mail, SMS and the social networking sites, FaceBook and Twitter. Senders, who are predominantly students and youth in search of government jobs, besides their parents and people from all walks of civil society emphasized that justice must be ensured in all institutions. Many of them stressed that Governor and Chief Minister must take necessary corrective measures to streamline the selection processes at PSC and thus restore the credibility of this vital institution.

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