The Madras High Court has dismissed petitions seeking a direction to the Teachers Recruitment Board (TRB) to appoint two persons for the post of Lecturer (senior scale) Law, though they were ineligible for consideration as they did not possess the requisite qualification on the last date of submission of the application.
It is well-settled law that a candidate should possess the requisite qualification on or before the last date of making the application, Justice Vinod K.Sharma observed in his order.
Keeping in view the admitted position that the two did not possess the requisite qualification on the last date of submitting the application, April 30, 2010, the petitioners did not have any right of consideration for appointment, the Judge said.
Pursuant to an advertisement, the petitioners, J. Starmi and S. Manjula applied for the post of Lecturer. The last date for submitting applications was April 30, 2010.
They appeared in the National Eligibility Test (NET) examination in June 2010 and were declared successful. They prayed for a direction to the TRB to consider their applications on a par with the applicants who had completed the NET prior to April 30.
Mr. Justice Vinod K. Sharma said the petitioners were admittedly not qualified as on April 30, 2010. The appointment of the two by excluding other eligible aspirants for being considered would be constitutionally invalid, as every eligible citizen had a right to be considered for public post. In case, the posts were offered to the petitioners by relaxing the qualification without fresh advertisement, the selection would be hit by Articles 14 and 16 of the Constitution.
