[2025:RJ-JP:46862-DB] HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE FOR RAJASTHAN BENCH AT JAIPUR D.B. Civil Writ Petition No. 15308/2025 Santosh Kumar Meena S/o Shri Ramkaran Meena, aged about 46 Years, R/o II/5, Mijestrate Colony, Bhilwara (Raj.) (Selection for Promotion to the Group-B Post of Assistant Signal and Telecommunication Engineer (Regular 70 Percent) through RRB Ajmer- 311001 ----Petitioner Versus 1. Union of India, through General Manager, North Western Railway, Jawahar Circle, Jagatpura, Jaipur- 302017. 2. Principal Chief Personnel Officer, North Western Railway, Jawahar Circle, Jagatpura, Jaipur -302017. 3. Principal Chief Signal and Telecommunication Engineer, North Western Railway, Jawahar Circle, Jagatpura, Jaipur- 302017. 4. Assistant Personnel Officer, North Western Railway, Jawahar Circle, Jagatpura, Jaipur- 302017. 5. Secretary, Railway Recruitment Board, Ajmer- 305001. ----Respondents For Petitioner(s) : Mr. Rakesh Kumar Saini For Respondent(s) : Mr. Alok Garg HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE SUDESH BANSAL HON'BLE MRS. JUSTICE SHUBHA MEHTA Order 20/11/2025 1. Heard counsel for both the parties and perused the record. 2. Petitioner has impugned the final order dated 05.08.2025 passed by the Central Administrative Tribunal Jaipur Bench, Jaipur in Original Application No. 421/2025, dismissing petitioner’s application and declining to interfere in the issue of correct/wrong [2025:RJ-JP:46862-DB] (2 of 6) [CW-15308/2025] answers in respect of four questions as also did not entertain the prayer of petitioner to constitute an Expert Committee. 3. It appears that petitioner appeared and participated in an examination, conducted on 04.05.2025 and 18.05.2025 for promotion from “Group-C” to “Group-B” to the post of Assistant Signal & Telecommunication Engineer (ASTE), against 70% regular quota vacancies. In the final result of examination declared on 13.07.2025, petitioner was not shortlisted for viva voce, hence, he preferred an Original Application, raising an issue that four questions of ID No. 2504, 2520, 2597 and 2591 were incorrectly answered in the final answer key whereas the answer suggested by petitioner to these questions stands correct, therefore, petitioner has been deprived to get proper marks for these four questions, hence, a prayer was made to set aside the final list dated 13.07.2025 and to direct the respondents to declare the result afresh, after treating the answer suggested by the petitioner to the four disputed questions as correct and accordingly, if petitioner is found to clear the examination, his candidature be considered for promotion from “Group-C” to “Group-B” on the post of ASTE against 70% regular quota. An alternative and additional prayer to constitute an Expert Committee to examine the correctness of answers of four questions was also made. 4. Learned Tribunal, having adverted to the four questions and taking into consideration the material provided by the petitioner to suggest, an another answer to these four questions than the answer, given by the respondents in the final answer key, observed as under:- [2025:RJ-JP:46862-DB] (3 of 6) [CW-15308/2025] “It is a settled proposition of law that courts are not the forums to determine the correct answers to the question posed in the examinations. We cannot substitute our opinion with the wisdom of the expert body which has designed the question paper and specified answers. As to the prayer seeking directions to the respondents to constitute an Expert Committee for examining the answers of the above mentioned 04 questions, the applicant has not been able to justify his prayer, on the other hand, we have examined that the answers published by the respondents were determined by the experts and were uniform for all the candidates and the directions for constituting an Expert Committee to re- examine the answers of the questions posed in the examinations because of the perception of each and every participant cannot be done. In view of the above, the O.A. is dismissed. No order as to costs.” 5. We do not find the observations made by the learned Tribunal suffer from any infirmity. The legal position in respect of issue in question is well established and in that context, reference of a landmark and off-quoted judgment of the Hon’ble Supreme Court delivered in case of Ran Vijay Singh Vs. State of Uttar Pradesh & Ors. [(2018) 2 SCC 357], would be suffice. The Hon’ble Supreme Court, in this judgment, after considering the large number of earlier decisions, culled out few broad principles, applicable in such a situation and following observations were propounded by the Hon’ble Supreme Court:- “30. The law on the subject is therefore, quite clear and we only propose to highlight a few significant conclusions. They are: 30.1. If a statute, Rule or Regulation governing an examination permits the re-evaluation of an answer sheet or scrutiny of an answer sheet as a matter of right, then the authority conducting the examination may permit it; 30.2. If a statute, Rule or Regulation governing an examination does not permit re-evaluation or scrutiny of an answer sheet (as distinct from prohibiting it) then the Court may permit re-evaluation or scrutiny only if it is demonstrated very clearly, without any “inferential process of reasoning or by a process of rationalisation” and only in rare or exceptional cases that a material error has been committed; [2025:RJ-JP:46862-DB] (4 of 6) [CW-15308/2025] 30.3. The Court should not at all re-evaluate or scrutinize the answer sheets of a candidate – it has no expertise in the matter and academic matters are best left to academics; 30.4. The Court should presume the correctness of the key answers and proceed on that assumption; and 30.5. In the event of a doubt, the benefit should go to the examination authority rather than to the candidate. 31. On our part we may add that sympathy or compassion does not play any role in the matter of directing or not directing re-evaluation of an answer sheet. If an error is committed by the examination authority, the complete body of candidates suffers. The entire examination process does not deserve to be derailed only because some candidates are disappointed or dissatisfied or perceive some injustice having been caused to them by an erroneous question or an erroneous answer. All candidates suffer equally, though some might suffer more but that cannot be helped since mathematical precision is not always possible. This Court has shown one way out of an impasse – exclude the suspect or offending question. 32. It is rather unfortunate that despite several decisions of this Court, some of which have been discussed above, there is interference by the Courts in the result of examinations. This places the examination authorities in an unenviable position where they are under scrutiny and not the candidates. Additionally, a massive and sometimes prolonged examination exercise concludes with an air of uncertainty. While there is no doubt that candidates put in a tremendous effort in preparing for an examination, it must not be forgotten that even the examination authorities put in equally great efforts to successfully conduct an examination. The enormity of the task might reveal some lapse at a later stage, but the Court must consider the internal checks and balances put in place by the examination authorities before interfering with the efforts put in by the candidates who have successfully participated in the examination and the examination authorities. The present appeals are a classic example of the consequence of such interference where there is no finality to the result of the examinations even after a lapse of eight years. Apart from the examination authorities even the candidates are left wondering about the certainty or otherwise of the result of the examination–whether they have passed or not; whether their result will be approved or disapproved by the Court; whether they will get admission in a college or University or not; and whether they will get recruited or not. This unsatisfactory situation does not work to anybody’s advantage and such a state of uncertainty results in confusion being worse confounded. The overall and larger impact of all this is that public interest suffers.” [2025:RJ-JP:46862-DB] (5 of 6) [CW-15308/2025] 6. The ratio decidendi and the proposition of law expounded by the Hon’ble Supreme Court in case of Ran Vijay Singh (supra) has been followed and reiterated in a case of Vikesh Kumar Gupta & Ors. Vs. State of Rajasthan & Ors. [(2021) 2 SCC 309)] wherein following observations were made:- “16. In view of the above law laid down by this Court, it was not open to the Division Bench to have examined the correctness of the questions and the answer key to come to a conclusion different from that of the Expert Committee in its judgment dated 12.03.2019. Reliance was placed by the Appellants on Richal & Ors. v. Rajasthan Public Service Commission10 In the said judgment, this Court interfered with the selection process only after obtaining the opinion of an expert committee but did not enter into the correctness of the questions and answers by itself. Therefore, the said judgment is not relevant for adjudication of the dispute in this case. 17. A perusal of the above judgments would make it clear that courts should be very slow in interfering with expert opinion in academic matters. In any event, assessment of the questions by the courts itself to arrive at correct answers is not permissible. The delay in finalization of appointments to public posts is mainly caused due to pendency of cases challenging selections pending in courts for a long period of time. The cascading effect of delay in appointments is the continuance of those appointed on temporary basis and their claims for regularization. The other consequence resulting from delayed appointments to public posts is the serious damage caused to administration due to lack of sufficient personnel.” 7. We have also looked into the disputed four questions, of which answers have been questioned by the petitioner. The material obtained by petitioner from website, internet and the circulars, placed on record by him, itself do not, prima facie, prove that the answer, opted and finalized by the respondents can be held to be incorrect. Needless to observe that the respondents have finalized the answers of these questions, following the report of Expert Committee and this Court while exercising its jurisdiction of judicial review, may not sit over as an Appellate Court over the [2025:RJ-JP:46862-DB] (6 of 6) [CW-15308/2025] report of Expert Committee. It is not a case where on the face value or on the basis of the material relied upon by the petitioner, the final answers of four questions as finalized by respondents, can be held as absurd or incorrect. 8. The Division Bench of this Hon’ble Court while dealing with the similar issue in case of Rajasthan Public Service Commission Vs. Ankit Sharma: D.B. Special Appeal Writ No. 429/2022, having considered the proposition of law as expounded by the Hon’ble Supreme Court, held and observed in Para No. 14 as under:- “14. We have referred to the consistent trend of the case law coming from the Supreme Court on the subject. Broadly the approach in such situation is that the scope of judicial review against expert’s opinion is extremely limited. There is a requirement of finality to the process of public employment. This is not to suggest that judicial review is completely shutout; it cannot be. However unless the situation presents a clear cut, black and white, open and shut choice of the decision of the expert body being palpably wrong, the Court would not interfere. An element of tolerance to the minor error or calibration is discernible since achieving certainty and finality is also important. The finality and perfection are sworn enemies.” 9. As far as prayer of petitioner to constitute an Expert Committee, same has not been found fair, genuine and justified and the Tribunal has rightly declined such prayer. 10. As a result, we are not inclined to interfere with the impugned order and writ petition is hereby dismissed. 11. Stay application and other pending application(s), if any, stand disposed of. (SHUBHA MEHTA),J (SUDESH BANSAL),J NITIN /6