Recruitment disputes belong before the Tribunal Bench with jurisdiction over the examination region.

The applicant challenged the rejection of her candidature for the post of Vocational Instructor (Cosmetology), Post Code NR27324, under Advertisement No. Phase XII/2024.

She sought reconsideration of her experience for the periods 10 January 2020 to 31 July 2021 and 8 September 2022 to 15 March 2024, and appointment to the post.

She had taken the examination at Meerut, Uttar Pradesh.

When the Principal Bench raised territorial jurisdiction, the applicant argued that the Commission’s headquarters in New Delhi made the application maintainable there.

The respondents relied on Clause 24 of the advertisement, which ties jurisdiction to the place of the concerned Regional Office where the candidate took the examination.

Whether the Principal Bench had territorial jurisdiction to hear the applicant’s challenge to the rejection of her candidature.

Whether the application could be dismissed for want of territorial jurisdiction without examining the merits of the applicant’s claim.

Clause 24 of the recruitment advertisement provided that disputes concerning the recruitment would be subject to the jurisdiction of the Courts or Tribunals covering the concerned Commission Regional Office where the candidate appeared for the examination.

Rule 6 of the Central Administrative Tribunal (Procedure) Rules, 1987 addresses the place for filing an application, while Section 25 of the Administrative Tribunals Act, 1985 empowers the Chairman to transfer a case from one Bench to another.

The Tribunal also applied the principle that a candidate who participates in a selection process is ordinarily bound by its stated terms and cannot accept those terms for participation while seeking to disregard a jurisdictional stipulation.

The applicant took the examination at Meerut, which the Tribunal found fell within the Staff Selection Commission’s Central Region, whose Regional Office was at Prayagraj/Allahabad.

Under Clause 24, the dispute therefore fell within the territorial jurisdiction of the Allahabad Bench, not the Principal Bench merely because the Commission’s headquarters were in New Delhi.

The Tribunal noted that the applicant had been given an opportunity to pursue the statutory transfer mechanism but insisted that the Principal Bench decide the application on its merits.

In light of the advertisement’s jurisdictional term and the territorial allocation of matters among Tribunal Benches, the Principal Bench declined to proceed.

It left the applicant at liberty to pursue any remedy available before the appropriate Bench or forum, disposed of any pending miscellaneous applications, and made no order as to costs.