Chennai: Pulling up the Tamil Nadu Public Service Commission (TNPSC) for handling the present important selection of Group-I services in a cavalier fashion and observing that by framing defective question and keys, it is possible that meritorious candidates can lose their opportunity to be selected ultimately for public service, the Madras high court has directed the TNPSC to ensure that in future selection, such mistakes do not occur.
Justice V.Parthiban gave the directive while dismissing a petition from S.Vignesh, which sought a direction to the TNPSC, to revise the answer keys and the list of selected candidates for admission to the main written examination with respect of posts included in Combined Civil Services-I Examination (Group-1 Services) 2016-2019.
The judge extracted the observations of a division bench of this court made in 2009 relating to conduct of examinations by TNPSC, which stated that "Before we part with this matter, we would like to express our hope that the TNPSC will be more careful in future while conducting the examinations. If the answers to the questions posted are to be rendered in an objective manner, the public service commission should be very vigilant about the correctness of the answers. The paper setters and the examiners ought to have greater concern for the large number of candidates who give this examination and whose future career depends upon their selection. We expect the public service commission to be much more thoughtful while setting papers for the future examinations to be conducted by them".
The judge said unfortunately, despite the above observation of the division bench several years before, it appears that the Commission has not taken cue from such caution by the court.
If only the Commission has taken into consideration the observation of the division bench in all seriousness, it could have avoided the defects that have crept in, in the setting of questions and the identification of key answers. It appears that despite its past mistake, the Commission has handled the present important selection of Group-I services in a cavalier manner, the judge added.
The judge said the TNPSC was a premier recruiting agency for recruitment of candidates for appointment to state public service. Such an agency, which was entrusted with the task of mass recruitment in various services, cannot assume its role lightly and allow mistake of the present nature to creep in the selection process, quite often.
The credibility of the commission would be at stake before the public at large if the mistakes were often repeated. The commission, which probably did not remember its past mistakes, has repeated the same in the present selection.
Therefore, in public interest, the commission must ensure that in future selection, such mistakes do not occur, the judge added.
