Madras High Court has directed the Tamil Nadu Public Service Commission (TNPSC) to make public marks secured by the candidates who appeared in competitive exams conducted by it for Group II services in November 2012 within four weeks.
Justice S Nagamuthu, who passed the order on a petition by a candidate whose plea for letting him know the marks obtained by him had been rejected by TNPSC, did not agree with the contention of the commission that in view of confidentiality, the marks could be published only after final selection was made.
Referring to a stand of TNPSC that the marks can be disclosed for any individual on their application under the Right to Information Act, the Judge said, "I do not find any reason to why such information should be withheld without making it public thereby driving thousands of candidates to approach the TNPSC under the RTI Act."
He further stressed the need that there should not be any room for arbitrariness in public employment and said "Caesar's wife must be above suspicion" and the TNPSC ought to have published the marks of candidates before calling them for interview.
Petitioner A Gopikrishnan, a Scheduled Caste candidate, had sought to know the exact marks secured by him.
