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Supreme Court in its judgment dated August 17, 2020, restored the order of the Kerala Administrative Tribunal, holding that Government Orders subsequent to announcement of results, can have retrospective effect as they are mere clarifications to the already existing positions, and do not better the case of appellants in any manner.

The controversy relates to whether B.Ed. degree held by appellants, not mentioning subject specifically required by the notification by KPSC, can be considered for the position advertised or not. The Top Court held in affirmation, elaborating upon principles of Service Jurisprudence.

A Division Bench of Justice L. Nageswara Rao and Justice Aniruddha Bose, while observing that the GOs issued subsequently by the Govt. of Kerala were mere clarifications, said,

“The principle of service jurisprudence that a candidate must possess the requisite qualification for a post on the date of issue of employment notification cannot be applied in the appellants’ cases, as in our view, they possessed equivalent qualifications when they applied for the posts. The GOs only confirmed the equivalency of their B.Ed. degrees. In our opinion, they shall be deemed to have had the equivalent qualification on the relevant date. As we have held that the respective GOs only clarified or confirmed an existing status of certain educational qualifications, in absence of specific instance of similarly situated but unspecified number of persons having not applied for the posts would be unfair to the ones who apply for the same and undergo three levels of litigations to establish that they had equivalent degrees.”

It was added that the GOs did not referred to any intervening circumstances which could imply that the respective degrees held by the appellants acquired a certain status because of such circumstances – they merely happen to clarify what already existed and cannot be construed to have elevated the position of the degree in any manner.

The issue dealt by the Court in the present appeals was whether the B.Ed. degree possessed by appellants fulfilled the eligibility criteria mentioned in the post advertised by the KPSC.

It is recorded by the Court that the certificate of the appellant did not specify the individual subjects which formed part of his curriculum but in a document captioned “Study Certificate” issued by University of Mysore, from where he pursued his B.Ed., specified that he passed the examination.

Kerala Public Service Commission (KPSC) had rolled out an advertisement on December 31, 2012, for the post of High School Assistant (Natural Science), to which appellants had applied. Controversy arose when both the appellants were included in the main list but did not have “Natural Science” as a specific subject mentioned to their degree.

Both the candidates were granted requisite time to produce documents in support of their eligibility. Meanwhile, they approached the State Administrative Tribunal seeking an order in their favour to participate in the interview process, subject to further orders in the case.

They participated in the interview, however, results of both the candidates were withheld against which they once again approached the Tribunal, successfully seeking an order in their favour – Having their names in the final ranked list.

During the pendency of their cases before the Tribunal, the Dept. of Higher Education, Govt. of Kerala issued 2 GOs which broadly sustained the claim of the appellants of having degrees equivalent to that of the concerned subject.

The KPSC assailed the Tribunal’s order before the High Court stating that the same cannot be given retrospective effect.

The High Court the contentions of the KPSC, observing that GOs cannot be relied upon by the appellants as they were issued subsequent to the employment notifications and upon conclusion of the selection process.

Appellants case before the Top Court was that their B.Ed. degrees should be accepted as their subjects in the respective degree courses were equivalent to the designated subjects, stipulated in the employment notifications.

Case Title: Praveen Kumar v. Kerala Public Service Commission