Haryana Judicial Service Mains Exam: Justice A K Sikri to examine answer scripts

Haryana Judicial Service Mains Exam: Supreme Court appoints Justice A K Sikri (Retd) to examine answer scripts

To report to the Court whether evaluation method should be accepted

The Leaflet

| @theleaflet_in | May 3,2019

A two-judge bench of the Supreme Court, comprising Chief Justice of India (CJI) Ranjan Gogoi and Justice Deepak Gupta today appointed former judge of the Supreme Court, Justice A K Sikri (Retd) to look into the answer scripts of candidates who had appeared in the Haryana Judicial Service Mains Examination for the post of civil judges.

The Supreme Court has requested Justice Sikri to examine the answer scripts and inform it if the pattern followed in the evaluation of answer scripts should be accepted by the apex court.

The court has also directed the Punjab and Haryana High Court to make all the answer scripts available to the retired Supreme Court judge.

The Supreme Court had on April 29, 2019, issued notice on the challenge to the selection process and the evaluation method adopted in the Mains Examination for the post of Civil Judge (Junior Division) in Haryana, the results of which were declared on April 11.

The Court had also restrained the Punjab and Haryana High Court from appointing junior civil judges in the Haryana Judicial Service without the leave of the court.

The Registrar General of the Punjab and Haryana High Court was also summoned to the Supreme Court today to produce records of the selection, including the evaluation of the answer scripts of all the candidates.

The petitioners have alleged that there was a serious problem with the evaluation method followed for selecting judicial officers in Haryana. A total 14,301 students took the preliminary examination held on December 22, 2018 for a total 107 vacancies.

“1,282 students, out of 14,301, who were declared successful in preliminary examination, took the main examination held on March 15 and 17, 2019,” the petitioners said.

The main examination was cleared by only nine students out of 1,282, against the total vacancies of 107 which means that a total of 99.298 percent of the students failed the test, the plea said.

The petitioners claimed that some of the candidates who had not been found fit for the interview were toppers and gold medallists in their law colleges.

The petitioners have prayed for quashing the examination result as well as for the revaluation of the main examination paper of the petitioners by an independent expert committee.