Andhra Candidate Withdraws Plea In Supreme Court Regarding Telangana Judicial Service Mandate For Enrollment In Telangana
The Supreme Court today(July 14) dismissed as withdrawn a special leave petition filed by a judicial aspirant challenging the Telangana High Court's judgment whereby her appointment as a judicial officer was subjected to the outcome of a matter challenging April 2024 notification of the Telangana High Court for post of civil judge, which restricted appointment only to those candidates enrolled with Bar Council of Telangana.
A bench comprising Justice Dipankar Datta and AG Masih dismissed the SLP, stating that the matter is already pending before the Supreme Court.
Justice Datta said: "Other matters are there, let it come up. If you succeed, the High Court administration has also said that there are sufficient number of vacancies and you could be accommodated. Just don't think about only yourself. Once you become a judicial officer, you pass the examination, you must think about society. If you decide contentious matters, and thereafter, if somebody comes up and says that you didn't have the basic eligibility to become a judge...Withdraw this."
As per the brief facts, the petitioner had challenged Clause 6(A)(III) of the April 10, 2024, notification of the Telangana High Court inviting applications for appointment to the post of Civil Judge (Junior Division). The said clause imposed a restriction that only candidates enrolled with the Bar Council of Telangana or practising before subordinate courts of the Telangana High Court were eligible. It was alleged that the impugned restriction imposes a residence-based or place-of-practice-based exclusion, prohibited in Article 16(2).
The petitioner, from the Bar Council of Andhra Pradesh, filed a writ petition, which came to be dismissed along with other similarly pending petitions. Aggrieved, several candidates approached the Supreme Court, which, through an interim order dated May 17, 2024, permitted petitioners to participate in the recruitment process provisionally.
Relying on the interim order, the petitioner approached the Telangana High Court, which allowed her to appear for the exams provisionally. The petitioner qualified for the preliminary and written examination and was selected for interview. Subsequently, she qualified for the exam. Later, the Telangana High Court disposed of the writ petitions with a direction that appointment orders may be issued to selected candidates except the petitioners in those writ petitions, whose appointment will be subject to the outcome of the matter pending before the Supreme Court.
It is the case of the petitioner that she is being wrongly denied issuance of an appointment letter: "Despite the Petitioner's name being included in the final provisional selection list and her successful completion of all stages of the recruitment process including Preliminary Examination, Mains, and Interview, the Registry of the Telangana High Court has not issued her appointment order."
Case Title: PASUPULETI BHAVYA SREE v THE STATE OF TELANGANA AND ORS|SLP(C) No. 17628/2025
Appearances: Mr. Gagan Gupta, Sr. Adv. Mr. Abhinay, AOR Ms. Kirti Vyas, Adv [petitioner]