New Delhi: The State Government's power to make appointments to higher posts cannot be questioned through a public interest litigation petition, the Supreme Court has held.

Giving this ruling a Bench, consisting of Justice A.R. Lakshmanan and Justice Tarun Chatterjee, said the High Courts should not entertain quo warranto writ petitions challenging the appointments from those who had no locus standi.

Best possible choice

It said the Government had to make the best possible choice keeping in view the larger interests of the administration.

The court could not sit in judgment over the wisdom of the Government in the choice of the person to be appointed so long as he possessed the prescribed qualification and otherwise eligible.

Writing the judgment for the Bench, Justice Lakshmanan said: ``So long as the appointment is made on account of the exigencies of administration, it would be valid and not open to attack under Articles 14 and 16 of the Constitution (equality before law and equality of opportunity in matters of public appointment)."

The Bench said evaluation of the comparative merits of the candidates could not be gone into in a PIL petition and a third party would have no locus standi to canvass the legality or the correctness of the action.

The Karnataka High Court acting on a PIL petition from the Karnataka Urban Water Supply and Drainage Board Employees' Association had quashed the appointment of B. Srinivasa Reddy as Managing Director.

The present appeals by Mr. Reddy and the Karnataka Government were against the High Court judgment.

Allowing the appeals, the Bench pulled up the trade union for suppressing the fact that its registration had been cancelled.

The Bench said ``courts cannot grant any relief to a person who comes to a court with unclean hands and mala fide intention/motive."

It said a writ of quo warranto could only be issued when the appointment was contrary to the statutory rules.

After perusing the files, it said the Chief Minister after considering the relevant material, experience in administration and capacity in commercial matters of Mr. Reddy had considered his appointment and there was no violation of any statutory rule. Even otherwise, the State Government had unrestricted power to make a contractual appointment, it said.

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