PPSC postpones interviews for posts of Asst Dist Attorney

Saurabh Malik

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, June 22

Three days before interviews for the posts of Assistant District Attorney were scheduled, the Punjab Public Service Commission has postponed the same. An undertaking to this effect was furnished before a vacation Bench of the Punjab and Haryana High Court on Friday.

The undertaking before Justice Amit Rawal came during the hearing of a petition challenging Punjab Public Service Commission’s decision to award negative marks to candidates raising objections to wrong answer keys in the selection process.

As the petition filed against the Punjab Public Service Commission by Sandeep Kumar through counsel Davinder Singh Khurana came up for resumed hearing, Punjab Additional Advocate-General Hittan Nehra, on the instructions of an official, submitted that the interview slated for June 25 for the posts of Assistant District Attorney would be extended for two weeks.

“In view of the undertaking given by advocate Nehra on the instructions of the official of Punjab Public Service Commission that the state would not undertake the exercise of interviews slated for June 25 and postpone the same by by way of a newspaper in order to avoid any inconvenience to candidates, the hearing of the writ petition is deferred to July 6,” Justice Rawal asserted.

The challenge in the present writ petition was to answer keys dated May 23 issued by the PPSC in pursuance of the examination held for filing up the posts of Assistant District Attorney. Describing an answer key as the “most sketchy and incorrect”, Khurana drew the court’s attention to a public notice dated March 18, whereby objections to questions were invited with condition of negative marking in case the objections were found to be frivolous. It rather stated that 1.5 marks would be deducted from the candidate’s aggregate for every objection overruled by experts’ opinion. Referring to appointment of Ayurvedic doctors, Khurana said the criteria of negative marking “has already been commented upon to be fallacious”.