Candidates must furnish mandatory recruitment documents by the application deadline; later compliance cannot cure the default.

The petitioner, then an Assistant Teacher, applied for recruitment to the post of Excise Sub-Inspector under the notification dated 28 February 2017.

She scored 96 marks, compared with 94 marks scored by respondent No. 3, but respondent No. 3 was included in the provisional and final selection lists.

The recruitment notification required candidates to submit a no-objection certificate (NOC) from their existing department with the application. The petitioner had produced an NOC dated 2016, but not one current as of the application date; she also submitted objections to the provisional list after the specified seven-day period.

The Karnataka State Administrative Tribunal dismissed her application challenging the selection. The High Court considered her challenge to the Tribunal’s order and related recruitment decisions.

Respondent No. 3 had joined duty and died while the Tribunal proceedings were pending.

The Court considered its supervisory and writ jurisdiction under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution, the Karnataka Excise Services (Recruitment) Rules, 1996, as amended in 2009, and the recruitment notification issued under those Rules.

It applied the principles that recruitment conditions are binding, eligibility is assessed by the stipulated application deadline, and adherence to notified criteria safeguards fairness, transparency, and equality in public recruitment.

The Court considered Ms. Pooja R. v. State of Karnataka and Dwarika Prasad (D) through LRs v. Prithvi Raj Singh, but held them inapplicable on the facts.

The petitioner’s higher score did not cure her failure to satisfy the notification’s NOC requirement by the application deadline. The Court held that allowing her to provide the required NOC later would depart from the published conditions and undermine equal treatment of candidates.

It distinguished Pooja R., where the defect was verifiable from the existing records and a vacancy was available, and found no comparable hyper-technical approach by the Tribunal of the kind addressed in Dwarika Prasad.

Respondent No. 3’s subsequent death did not confer on the petitioner a right to appointment; the Court observed that a fresh recruitment notification would be required.

Pending applications, if any, were disposed of.