Courts not experts to decide if BE is similar to BSc: HC

Courts not experts to decide if BE is similar to BSc: HC

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

Bengaluru:10.04.2021

Courts are not expert bodies to decide that a bachelor’s degree in engineering is equivalent to that of science. It is for bodies like the University Grant Commission to decide, the high court observed while allowing a writ appeal filed by the Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board.

The board had challenged the order passed by a single bench on September 3, 2020, directing it to treat a degree in engineering on par with that in science and consider the candidature of seven applicants (all BE degree holders) for the post of assistant/clerk.

However, quoting from the Supreme Court’s directive in the Zahoor Ahmed case, a division bench headed by Justice Satish Chandra Sharma noted that an employer is entitled to prescribe qualifications as a condition of eligibility and there is no role or function of judicial review to expand upon the ambit of prescribed qualifications.

Pointing out that the single bench had erred in law and facts in allowing the writ petition, the division bench said it is purely the employer’s domain to frame recruitment rules and the prescription of qualification for a post is a matter of recruitment policy.

The single bench had said since the word ‘science’ has not been defined anywhere, it cannot be limited to include only a bachelor’s degree in science. However, BWSSB said by no stretch of imagination can a degree in engineering be treated as a graduation in science since engineering and science are two different disciplines.