There should be no discrimination in public employment based on place of residence of candidate: Kerala High Court

The Kerala High Court recently reiterated that a person cannot be denied public employment merely for the reason that they do not reside at a particular location [Liji AS v State of Kerala & Ors.]..Justice VG Arun observed that the legal position on the matter of discrimination of candidates based on domicile has been settled."The legal position that there cannot be discrimination in public employment based on the place of residence or domicile of a candidate is no more res integra," the Court held. In this regard, the Court referred to the decision of the Supreme Court in Kailash Chand Sharma v State of Rajasthan, in which the top court stated that "in the absence of parliamentary law, even the prescription of requirement as to residence within the State is a taboo.”.The petitioner had applied for the post of Accountant-cum-Data Entry Operator notified by the Annamanada Grama Panchayat under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MNREGS). After the interview, the petitioner was ranked first but nine members of the Panchayat committee, including the Vice President, were opposed to appointing her, for the reason that her place of residence was not within said panchayat.However, according to the petitioner, the ulterior motive behind this was to appoint a person who was a resident of the panchayat but had scored the least marks.Therefore, she approached the High Court seeking to quash the resolution of the panchayat members as arbitrary and unconstitutional and to declare her appointment based on the rank list.During the pendency of the case, the panchayat decided to not effect appointment to the post for the reason that they were facing a financial crunch due to the pandemic. So the petitioner amended her prayer to quash that decision. Advocate Thulasi K Raj, appearing for the petitioner, contended that the panchayat is bound to appoint the petitioner based on her rank and the decision not to appoint persons from outside the panchayat was against the constitutional guarantee under Article 16 of the Constitution of India.Advocate OD Sivadas, appearing for the panchayat, countered by saying that since a decision had been taken to not appoint anyone to the post, the question raised in the petition had been rendered moot.However, Senior Government Pleader V Venugopal concurred with the petitioner that her non-appointment for the reason given was illegal. Moreover, he submitted that, place of residence has no relevance in appointments under the MNREGS..The Court noted that the dictum in Kailash Chand Sharma has been followed by the Kerala High Court in a series of decisions. Hence, it deemed it appropriate to set aside the decision of the Panchayat Committee refusing appointment to the petitioner for the sole reason that she is not a resident of Annamanada.With regard to the decision of the Committee to not appoint anyone to the post, the Court ordered the State government to decide on whether whether the panchayat can unilaterally decide not to fill up a post created for the purpose of implementation of the MGNREGA Scheme. .[Read Judgment]