Prior continuous VHG engagement qualifies for age relaxation absent an express current-service requirement.

The applicant challenged his exclusion from the recruitment process for Constable in the J&K Police Armed/Executive Wings pursuant to Advertisement Notice dated 25 August 2015, issued under the J&K Special Recruitment Rules, 2015, notified by SRO 202 dated 30 June 2015.

The advertisement prescribed a general upper-age limit of 28 years as on 1 January 2015, but extended the upper limit to 37 years for SPOs/VHGs having the prescribed continuous period of engagement; for VHGs, the prescribed period was five years.

The applicant, born on 10 February 1979, claimed that he had served as a VHG from 5 July 1999 to 4 July 2005 and was subsequently re-engaged from 6 April 2015.

Although he was permitted to participate in the physical test and written examination, his candidature was later included in the list of disqualified candidates on the ground that he was over-aged.

Whether the applicant was entitled to the extended upper-age limit of 37 years applicable to VHG candidates on the basis of his earlier continuous VHG engagement from 1999 to 2005, despite the intervening break and his limited subsequent engagement before the advertisement.

Whether the applicant’s candidature could be rejected as over-aged after he had been permitted to participate in the physical and written examinations.

Whether the respondents were required to examine the applicant’s claim consistently with the treatment allegedly extended to other VHG candidates.

The Tribunal applied the eligibility conditions contained in the Advertisement Notice dated 25 August 2015, issued under the J&K Special Recruitment Rules, 2015, including the provision prescribing an upper age of 37 years for VHGs having a continuous engagement of at least five years.

It relied on Dr. M.V. Nair v. Union of India, (1993) 2 SCC 429, and Ashok Kumar Sharma v. Chander Shekhar, (1997) 4 SCC 18, for the rule that eligibility must ordinarily be determined with reference to the cut-off date prescribed in the applicable rules or advertisement and that the recruiting authority is bound by the terms of its advertisement.

It further relied on Maharashtra Public Service Commission v. Sandeep Shriram Warade, (2019) 6 SCC 362, for the principle that courts must neither add to nor rewrite qualifications prescribed by the recruiting authority, while giving the advertisement its plain, ordinary and grammatical meaning.

The Tribunal also applied the doctrine of legitimate expectation, holding that although participation in a selection process does not create an indefeasible right to appointment, an authority must act fairly and consistently where its conduct has represented that a candidate is prima facie eligible.

The Tribunal treated 1 January 2015 as the controlling date for age determination because the advertisement expressly prescribed that date.

However, it distinguished the question of age from the question of qualifying VHG engagement.

The advertisement required a VHG to have a “continuous period of engagement” of at least five years but did not state that the engagement had to be current, immediately preceding the advertisement, or subsisting on the cut-off date.

Reading such a requirement into the advertisement would impermissibly add a condition that the recruiting authority had not prescribed.

The applicant’s first spell of VHG service, from 1999 to 2005, was itself continuous and exceeded the minimum five-year requirement; the subsequent break could not retrospectively erase that completed period of qualifying engagement.

The respondents’ reliance on inadvertent participation was also rejected as unpersuasive because they had allowed the applicant to undergo successive stages of the selection process.

The applicant’s disqualification in the list of over-aged candidates was set aside.

The respondents were directed to reconsider his candidature by applying the prescribed age relaxation and to determine whether he satisfied all other eligibility conditions under the advertisement and applicable rules within eight weeks of receiving the order.

The application was accordingly allowed without costs; the interim protection concerning one VHG post was continued until the respondents took the directed decision.