Justice K. Sarath of the Telangana High Court on Thursday issued notices to the State government in a batch of writ petitions seeking a direction to stay the conduct of Group-I preliminary examination on June 11.
The judge, after hearing three writ petitions filed by different persons, instructed the State government and the Telangana State Public Service Commission to file counter-affidavits in the matter by Monday. The petitioners contended that it was unfair on the part of the TSPSC to go ahead with conduct of the preliminary exam even as the police were continuing the investigation into the leak of question paper. They maintained that some employees connected to the TSPSC and conduct of the exam were already apprehended by the police.
In this backdrop, holding of the exam by the same TSPSC was not correct. They sought a direction to declare conduct of the exam on June 11 illegal and arbitrary. The TSPSC’s decision to hold the exam without ascertaining how many persons were actually involved in leak of Group-I preliminary exam paper.
The petitioners’ counsel told the court that the Commission had earlier decided to cancel the exam after evidence about leak of the question paper emerged. The government constituted a Special Investigation Team to probe the matter. During the probe, the SIT arrested several persons and eventually the Commission decided to convene the exam again.
However, with the investigation still on and the likely arrest of more persons in the case, it would not be correct for the Commission to conduct the exam, they said. The Commission’s counsel argued that only two outsourced employees were among the arrested accused in the case. Arrangements had been made for smooth conduct of the exam in 991 centres in different parts of the State, he said.
