No adjudication is warranted once petitioners have taken the examination and the selection list is finalized.

The petitioners in three connected writ petitions challenged issues arising from the KPTCL recruitment examination process.

They sought, among other reliefs, acceptance of uploaded documents and permission to sit the examinations scheduled for 23–24 July 2022 or 7 August 2022; some also sought replies to their communications to KPTCL.

KPTCL submitted that hall tickets had been issued pursuant to interim orders, the petitioners had attempted the examination, and the selection list had been finalized.

1. Whether the petitions seeking responses to the petitioners’ communications and acceptance of uploaded documents required adjudication after the examinations had been attempted and the selection list finalized.

2. Whether any effective relief remained in relation to permission to sit the scheduled examinations.

The petitions invoked Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution of India and sought, principally, mandamus.

The Court’s stated basis for disposing of the petitions was that, in light of KPTCL’s submission that the petitioners had attempted the examinations and the selection list had been finalized, further adjudication would concern only an academic issue.

The Court recorded KPTCL’s submission that hall tickets had been issued pursuant to interim orders and the petitioners had attempted the examinations; it also noted that the selection list was finalized.

On that basis, it considered that adjudication of the petitions would be academic and declined to examine the requested reliefs on their merits.

It made no further order granting the substantive reliefs sought.