The Madras High Court on Wednesday vacated an order maintaining status quo with regard to campus interviews for recruitment by Central and State government undertakings.
The First Bench, consisting of Chief Justice M.Y. Eqbal and Justice T.S. Sivagnanam, said if the interim order on a writ petition, passed in February this year, was allowed to continue, it would cause undue harassment to candidates. The balance of convenience appeared to be more on the candidates’ side who had been selected much prior to the status quo order. However, the Bench made it clear that any appointment made after the filing of the writ petition would be subject to the result of the petition.
The petitioner, M. Palanimuthu, an advocate of Saidapet here, sought a direction to authorities to ban campus interviews and restrain the Central and State government undertakings from conducting campus interviews. His contention was that in general, campus interviews/selections were illegal. Because of that practice, parents made a rush to those institutions for admissions. This paved the way for collecting higher capitation fees. Campus interviews should not be allowed as several well-qualified candidates were waiting for employment after finishing their education.
Counsel appearing for the candidates impleaded said much prejudice would be caused to them if they were not allowed to join the posts for which they were selected, since campus recruitment had been done solely on merit and after following the roster system. They said it was not the petitioner’s case that all vacancies in various public sector undertakings were being filled only through campus interviews.
The Bench said in the light of the averments, it was of the opinion that if the interim order was allowed to continue, it would cause undue harassment to the candidates. Hence, it was vacating that order.
