EWS Reservation Candidates Must Possess and Produce Valid Certificates for the Relevant Financial Year by the Cut-off Date

The Respondent applied for the post of Constable (Executive) Male in the Delhi Police Examination-2023 under the Economically Weaker Section (EWS) category

The Recruitment Notice dated 01.09.2023 set a cut-off date of 30.09.2023 for the possession of a valid EWS certificate in the prescribed format (Annexure-VII) for the relevant financial year

During document verification, the Respondent produced an EWS certificate dated 02.09.2019

His candidature was subsequently treated under the Unreserved (UR) category per Clause 6.4 of the Notice, as the 2019 certificate did not cover the relevant financial year and he failed to meet the UR cut-off marks

The Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) allowed the Respondent's Original Application, directing the Petitioner to accept his candidature based on certificates issued in 2023 and 2024

The Petitioner challenged the CAT order via this writ petition.

1. Whether the Respondent satisfied the mandatory eligibility condition of possessing and producing a valid EWS certificate in the prescribed format and for the relevant financial year on or before the cut-off date of 30.09.2023

The Court primarily applied the Office Memoranda (OM) dated 19.01.2019 and 31.01.2019 issued by the DoPT, which establish that EWS eligibility must be determined based on the financial year immediately preceding the year of application

It relied on the Supreme Court precedents in Divya v. Union of India (2024), which held that possession of a valid Income and Asset Certificate (I&AC) for the relevant financial year by the cut-off date is a substantive eligibility condition

Sakshi Arha v. Rajasthan High Court (2025), which clarified that EWS/OBC-NCL categories are "dynamic" and require strict adherence to temporal stipulations in recruitment notifications

The Court also enforced Clause 6.4 of the Recruitment Notice, which mandates the rejection of EWS claims if certificates are issued after the crucial date

The Court reasoned that the Recruitment Notice's terms are peremptory and binding on all stakeholders to ensure transparency and equality under Article 14

Upon review of the PE&MT form, the Court found the Respondent only produced an EWS certificate dated 02.09.2019 at verification, which was legally irrelevant for the 2023 recruitment cycle

Although the Respondent later relied on a certificate dated 31.05.2023, the Court observed that this document ex-facie failed to adhere to the mandatory "Annexure-VII" format prescribed in the Notice

The Court rejected the Respondent’s argument regarding "vagueness" in the notice, holding that the relevant financial year (2022-23) was implicit in the EWS scheme and explicitly defined in the governing DoPT OMs

The Court distinguished EWS status from "caste," noting that while caste is immutable, EWS status is fluid and contingent on annual income, necessitating strict compliance with time-bound documentation

The CAT erred by treating the submission of a valid, formatted, and timely EWS certificate as a "mere technicality"

The High Court set aside the Impugned Order dated 04.04.2025 and upheld the Petitioner’s decision to treat the Respondent as an Unreserved category candidate. The writ petition was allowed