Supreme Court Dismisses Plea Challenging BPSC Chairman's Appointment, Rebukes Petitioner For Inaccurate Facts

The Supreme Court today (July 18) took a stern view over a lawyer who challenged the appointment of the Bihar Public Service Commission Chairperson, without mentioning accurate facts in the plea. 

While the court initially imposed costs of Rs.10,000/- on the lawyer, it was subsequently removed. The bench remarked that one has to work towards Public Interest Litigation with sincerity and not go behind publicity. 

"Practice sincerely, this is not the way to do it, if you take up Public Interest Litigation, you must give your life to it. You must thoroughly examine every fact, the burden is on you. And don't go behind this publicity business, it will not take you anywhere. It will only discredit you," the Court told him.

The bench of Justices PS Narasimha and AS Chandukar was hearing a writ petition filed by Advocate and petitioner-in-person Brajesh Singh for declaring the appointment of Bihar Public Service Commission Chairperson, Parmar Ravi Manubhai, as "completely illegal" and "arbitrary" on grounds that the appointment has taken place defying the mandate of Article 316(Appointment and term of office of members) of the Constitution of India.

The amicus appointed by the Court on the last hearing, today informed the bench that the appointment has been challenged by the petitioner on three grounds, firstly as per Article 316, only a person with "impeccable integrity" should be appointed as the Chairperson. Contrary to this, the Chairman is facing serious charges of corruption and forgery and as such his "integrity is doubtful", the petitioner argued.

Secondly, there has been an FIR registered against Manubhai, which, as per the petitioner, is still pending and thirdly, that Manubhai, as per the petitioner, was a State Civil Services Officer and continued to serve in the Bihar Cadre while he was appointed to the post. 

However, the amicus clarified that the FIR was filed in 2017, which was subsequently closed in 2022. The appointment of Manubhai was done in March 2024. 

On the aspect of whether any voluntary retirement was taken by Manubhai before being appointed as the Chairperson, the counsel for the State submitted that appointment was within the fold of Rule 2(e) of Bihar Public Service Commission Conditions of Service Regulations 1960 

As per the rule, a service member means " a person who, before his appointment as Member, was in the service of the Government of India or of a State in India, irrespective of whether he joins as Member before or after his retirement from such service" 

The Counsel for the state also stressed that the petitioner is a lawyer and was completely aware of the fact that the FIR was closed against Manubhai.

Taking serious note of the same, the bench asked the advocate/ petitioner to take Public Interest Litigation seriously and not file pleas for the sake of publicity. 

"You should be careful before you file petitions like this. We will impose costs on you. We knew there was something, we were not very confident, that's why we asked the amicus to assist us. You are a very young boy who just enrolled (in 2016)....."

"Practise sincerely, this is not the way to do it, if you take up Public Interest Litigation, you must give your life to it. You must thoroughly examine every fact, the burden is on you. And don't go behind this publicity business, it will not take you anywhere. It will only discredit you."

The bench proceeded to dismiss the petition with costs. The relevant part of the order is : 

" We had accepted this petition under Article 32 of the Constitution on the basis of certain facts that were mentioned in the petition. As we were not confident, we had also requested the learned counsel (amicus) to assist us in the matter. 

We are of the opinion that the facts concerned in the writ petition are not accurate. In this view of the matter, the SLP is dismissed with the cost of Rs. 10,000/- payable by the petitioner herein." 

 Upon the apology of the petitioner and assistance by the amicus, the court waived the costs imposed. 

Case Details: BRAJESH SINGH v. THE STATE OF BIHAR AND ORS| W.P.(C) No. 62/2025