In Sandeep Mittal v. State of U.P. and Another, the Allahabad High Court refused to issue a writ of mandamus to provide reservation benefit to EWS candidates but requested to adopt the policy.
The petitioner was a practicing Advocate in the District Court Meerut, UP and his enrollment no. was UP 7070/2005. The respondent issued a recruitment notification for direct recruitment to Uttar Pradesh Higher Judicial Services, 2020. The total number of vacancies were 98 and out of these, 87 were for direct recruitment. The vacancies for direct recruitment were distributed in the following manner:
18 – Schedule Caste candidates
01 – Schedule Tribe candidates
23 – Other Backward Class candidates
45 – General candidates
The petitioner applied for the same on 18 February 2021. He made a representation so as to seek the benefit of belonging to Economically Weaker Sections of the General category other than SC, ST, and OBC.
10% reservation for EWS (General) candidates
The petitioner contended that the Constitution was amended to provide 10% reservation for EWS General category candidates. Later, the Uttar Pradesh legislative assembly also passed a bill in the year 2020 in accordance with Article 16(6) of the Constitution.
The petitioner contended that the same reservation policy should be applicable to the High Court as well and cited examples of Rajasthan High Court and Punjab & Haryana High Court. Therfore, ignorance towards the 10% reservation policy for EWS general category candidates is violative of the constitutional mandate.
The petitioner did not qualify the preliminary examination. He thereafter, sought that if the reservation policy is not adopted either, then the Court should give him a chance to sit in the Mains examination or increase the age bar as he would be disqualified next year for being overage.
The Court took notice that the petitioner appeared in the preliminary examination as a general category candidate with his eyes wide open and never challenged the rules of Uttar Pradesh Higher Judicial services. The Allahabad High Court placed reliance on Nawal Kishore Mishra and others v. High Court of Judicate of Allahabad through its Registrar General and others and thereby observed that the High Court’s autonomy as contained in Articles 233 to 235 is a part of the basic structure of the Constitution. Had the state legislature been permitted to prescribe statutory scheme for reservation for recruitment to judicial service, it would violative of the basic structure of the Constitution.
It was further observed that once an advertisement is released, it is not proper to amend it and it would be a violation of the constitutional mandate.
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