High Court Division Bench Stays Order On Group I Posts

The Telangana High Court today stayed the single judge's order directing the Telangana Public Service Commission (TGPSC) to either re-evaluate the Group I Mains examination papers or conduct a fresh examination.

Any further proceedings by the TGPSC would be subject to the final outcome of the appeals, the bench said, and adjourned the case to October 15 for further proceedings.

On September 9, the single judge had set aside the final marks list of the examinations and directed the TGPSC either to manually re-evaluate the answer scripts or to conduct the examination afresh. Challenging the order, the TGPSC had filed an appeal before a division bench. Several selected candidates aggrieved by the ruling had also filed separate appeals. Petitions were filed by Paramesh Matta (of the Nandanam village in Bhuvanagiri mandal) and 221 other candidates.

When the appeals came up for hearing, the counsels for the appellants argued that the single judge had failed to consider their explanation regarding discrepancies in candidate numbers and the fact that 719 candidates had secured identical marks in the Mains examination. They also contended that there was no evidence to support the claim that 14.8% of the candidates who appeared for the exam at the Koti women's university were among the top 500.