4 Pages Missing From Civil Services Candidate’s Answer Booklet: Chhattisgarh HC Orders ₹50,000 Compensation, Though Even 30 Marks Would Not Clear Interview Cutoff

The petitioner participated in the Chhattisgarh Civil Services recruitment process, cleared the preliminary examination, and appeared in the mains examination. After the results were published, he obtained a copy of his answer booklet under the Right to Information Act, 2005, and discovered that pages 17–20 of one paper, carrying questions worth up to 30 marks, were missing.

The Commission stated that an evaluator had reported the missing pages during evaluation but that the petitioner had scored 695.5 marks, below the unreserved-category cut-off of 737.5.

The petitioner sought, among other relief, an inquiry and compensation. The High Court found that the Commission had neither informed him of the missing pages nor completed its inquiry.

The Court exercised its jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution in considering relief for the Commission’s alleged arbitrary inaction.

It relied on Dr. B.R. Ambedkar University, Agra v. Devarsh Nath Gupta, 2023 (12) SCALE 45, for the principle that any ancillary relief must be directly related to the facts and circumstances of the case, and that a fault in an individual matter does not justify reopening all concluded matters.

The Court also treated compensation as an appropriate case-specific remedy for the petitioner’s harassment and expenses arising from the Commission’s conduct.

The Court noted that the Commission learned during evaluation that pages were missing from the petitioner’s answer booklet, yet did not inform him or take concrete steps to identify the person responsible; the inquiry remained unfinished.

Although the petitioner’s marks, even with the maximum 30 marks available for the missing pages, would remain below the cut-off, the Court considered that this did not negate the harassment and expense caused by the Commission’s inaction.

Consistent with the limit on ancillary relief described in Dr. B.R. Ambedkar University, the Court awarded individual compensation rather than directing that the recruitment process be reopened.

It directed respondents numbered “3 and 4” in the operative order to pay within three months; the judgment’s cause title lists only three respondents.