1. ' A consolidated advertisement No, 6/93 appeared in the dailies of Pakistan on behalf of respondent Punjab Public Service Commission (hereinafter to be referred as Commission) on the 14th of May, 1993 for the appointment to the different posts. The present Constitutional petition pertains to the post of Assistant Professor Radiology respecting which advertisement was as under:-- ' Sr. No, 56 (Case No, 6-C/93): SIX TEMPORARY LIKELY TO BE MADE PERMANENT POSTS OF ASSISTANT PROFESSOR RADIOLOGY (DIAGNOSTIC) IN THE PUNJAB HEALTH DEPARTMENT. ZONAL ALLOCATION: All Punjab-1, Zone-II-1, Zone 1-4 QUALIFICATIONS: (1) M.B.,B.S. Or equivalent medical qualification recognised by the PMDC with following Post-Graduate qualification:-
(1) FCPS (Radiology Diagnostic) or equivalent qualification and 3 years' teaching or practical experience in the subject in a recognised institution before or after post-graduate if the person with aforesaid qualification is available then;
(i) M.B.,B.S. And Post-Graduate Diploma of DMRD qualification or other equivalent qualification and
(ii) 5 years' teaching or practical experience in the subject in a recognised institution before or after post-graduation.
(2) Preference:--Teaching experience or practical experience after post-graduation or practical experience before and after post-graduation.
2. ' Pay: B-18 ' AGE:-- 23 to 25 years on 10-6-1993.
3. ' ELIGIBILITY: Both Men and Women domiciled in Punjab.
4. ' The petitioner who was in U.K. Applied for this post on prescribed form. His application was received by respondent Commission on 3-6-1993 within time as according to the Commission itself the last date for the candidate from abroad was 24-6-1993. A letter/deficiency memo. Was sent by the Commission to the petitioner on 27-7-1993 at his father's address in Lahore as the foreign address was not available with the Commission. Through it the petitioner was asked to produce his foreign experience certificate duly recognised by Pakistan Medical and Dental Council
(PMDC) by 20-8-1993 (Annexure B). It was further provided that in case of failure to comply with, his application shall stand rejected and he would not be called for interview. The father-in-law of the petitioner submitted the experience certificates after getting it attested from the foreign Institutions to PMDC on 12-8-1993 for the grant of required certificate (Annexure "C"). In response to this letter the Secretary, PMDC wrote a letter on 17-8-1993 (Annexure D) pointing out the procedure of securing foreign recognised certificate in the following terms: ' RECOGNITION OF EXPERIENCE GAINED ABROAD "Please refer to your D.O. No, 102/93, dated the 12th August, 1993 received today regarding issuance of experience certificate to your son-in-law Dr. Farrukh J. Setna bearing PM&DC Regn. No, 2021-P. Dr. Setna has gained experience outside Pakistan which can be processed on the request of the doctor to enable him to submit to Punjab Public Service Commission.
(2) You may appreciate that there is a set procedure for this purpose and the doctor has to apply on prescribed form PM&DC IV which is enclosed and may be sent to Dr. Setna for submitting to this office after completion alongwith necessary documents, fees etc. ' On receipt of application form complete in all respect alongwith requisite documents, his case will be processed expeditiously."
5. ' Thereupon the Secretary to the Commission was requested by petitioner's father-in-law on 19-8- 1993 for the grant of extension of time for producing foreign experience certificate duly certified by PMDC as it was a time consuming process (Annexure E).
6. ' Grievance is made through -this Constitutional petition that without considering the petitioner's request for the extension of time, his application was rejected on the ground of non-production of foreign experience certificate on 13-9-1993 by the Commission. It is the case of the petitioner that the required certificate was received by his father-in-law on 14-9-1993 and the same was submitted on 15-9-1993 to the Commission who refused to consider the same. It is argued by the learned counsel that the petitioner's application was complete in all respects and full particulars were given therein. It was deficient only in respect of PMDC certificate qua recognition of foreign experience and the reliance of the respondent Commission on the instructions dated 29-12-1992 is arbitrary and unreasonable particularly so when the petitioner's application was not deficient as far as its particulars were concerned. Furthermore the required certificate was provided to the Commission much before the start of the interview. It is also argued that in the application form, the requirement of recognition certificate respecting foreign experience from PMDC was not mentioned.
7. ' Learned Law Officer admitted that the petitioner being a candidate from abroad was given further time till 20-8-1993 through letter dated 27-7-1993 issued by the Commission. He failed to comply with it and in that eventuality there was no alternative left with the Commission in view of the latest instructions dated 29-12-1992 but to reject his application. He has admitted that in para. 9, clause
(iii) in the prescribed form the word competent authority is mentioned and not the PMDC. However, in the advertisement the requirement of certificate from PMDC stood mentioned in clear terms which was in the following words: "(3) Candidates for the posts of Health Department possessing foreign qualification and/or experience should produce certificates of their unconditional registration/recognition/equivalence from the PMDC otherwise their applications will be rejected. It may be ensured that PMDC registration of the qualifications should stand valid for at least 6 months beyond the closing date for receipt of applications."
8. I have given my anxious consideration to the entire facts of this case and noticed that Services General Administration and Information Department on 30-7-1984 issued memo streamlining of procedure and system for selection of candidates through Punjab Public Service Commission. The deficiency memo. Was provided in para. 1 which read as under:
(1) DEFICIENCY MEMO.
9. ' At present deficiency memos are issued to the candidates enabling them to rectify the mistakes in their original applications. This is main source of delay in processing the applications. A candidate who is not careful enough to even ensure completion of his application deserves to be rejected outright. It has, therefore, been decided that incomplete applications shall be rejected straightaway. The aggrieved candidates may, however, appeal to the Member Incharge/Chairman of the Commission with reasonable grounds for reconsideration of rejection order.
10. ' This deficiency memo. Was subsequently amended on 29-12-1992 and the amended one is as under:- "Candidates are cautioned that if an application which is not signed and/or is received incomplete or wrongly filled in and it is not accompanied with any of the documents mentioned in the application form it will be summarily rejected, and no appeal against its rejection will be entertained."
11. ' It is pertinent to mention here that the aforesaid amended memo is also given as a CAUTIONARY NOTE by the Commission with the application form.
12. ' The above resume demonstrates that earlier an appeal was provided to the Chairman of the Commission in case of rejection of application due to some deficiency. The newly-added clause dated 29-12-1992 has taken away the aforesaid right of appeal and if mandatory interpretation is given to it than any application can be rejected summarily on trivial ground. It shows that the Commission itself has not treated these instructions as mandatory while applying to the candidates from abroad who have been given 4 weeks latitude allowance to remove the defect if any in their applications. Even otherwise the instructions being penal in nature are to be beneficially interpreted as its strict application would generate frustration and amount to technical knock out which course of action has always been disapproved by the superior Courts. Reliance in this respect is placed upon Manager, Jammu and Kashmir State Property in Pakistan v. Khuda Yar and another PLD 1975 SC 678 wherein it was held as under: "The proposition could hardly be disputed that the principal object behind all legal formalities is to safeguard the paramount interest of justice. In fact while considering the importance of legal technicalities and rules of procedure in the administration of justice, it is inevitable to re-call the various evolutionary stages in the transition from justice without law of primitive society to justice in accordance with law of modern society and the conflict between equity and law in judicial history.
13. It cannot be denied- that legal precepts were devised with a view to impart certainty, consistency and uniformity to administration of justice and to secure it against arbitrariness, errors of individual judgment and mala fide. Over a period of time this development of codes and rules led to the revolution of what is called "jurisprudence of conception" a system of logical deduction from fixed premises. In order to avoid the rigidity and hardship of ultra formalism recourse is had to principle of equitable application and interpretation of legal precepts and conferment of judicial discretion on the Courts as envisaged by Order XLI, rule 33 of the CPC in regard to Constitutional power of this Court to do complete justice in all matters. These two provisions read together lead to the irresistible conclusion that mere technicalities unless offering an insurmountable hurdle should not be allowed to defeat the ends of justice. It was observed by Kaikaus, J. In Imtiaz Ahmad v. Ghulam Ali (1) as follows:-- "I must confess that having dealt with technicalities for more than forty years, out of which thirty years are at the Bar, I do not feel much impressed with them. I think the proper place of procedure in any system of administration of justice is to help and not to thwart the grant to the people of their rights. All technicalities have to be avoided unless it be essential to comply with them on ground of public policy. The English system of administration of justice on which our own is based may be to a certain extent technical but we are not to take from that system its defect. Any system which by giving effect to the form and not to the substance defeats substantive rights is defective to that extent. The ideal must always be a system that gives to every person what is his."
14. In the case in hand it is apparent that the petitioner made frantic/obsessive efforts to secure the certificate from PMDC in time and succeeded much before the start of interview and presented the same before the Commission. Its non-consideration in the circumstances has completely prejudiced his case.
15. ' I am fortified in this approach by a case reported in Ghulam Murtaza v. Chairman, Selection Board, Principal, King Edward Medical College, Lahore and 2 others (1981 CLC 274) where the learned Judge has held as under:- "I have heard the learned counsel for the parties and perused the record with their assistance. It would appear from the statement of facts made above that the petitioner had filed a certificate of having completed the N.C.C. Training alongwith his application/admission form in time. The defect if any of signing of the certificate not by the Incharge but by the Authorised Officer was also removed and formal certificate submitted before final selection. A little technicality has been made a fetish of deprivation. Merit has to be calculated for admission with reference to facts and reality. If these exist at the relevant time but the certification therefore which is not in the hands of the candidate follows subsequently, the candidate cannot be punished for the acts of others. In this view of the matter, the petitioner's application for admission was rejected without lawful authority."
16. ' Similarly in Habibur Rehman v. Government of Pakistan and others (1979 SCM R 121) it was held by the Hon'ble Supreme Court in an admission to Medical College case that in the absence of a mandatory provision, a certificate subsequently issued and produced before the selection, has to be taken into account.
17. In view of what has been stated above, I am of the considered view that the strict application of instructions of 29-12-1992 in the case of the petitioner whose application was complete in all respects except foreign experience certification from PMDC which too was provided before the holding of the interview, the action of the respondent Commission in rejecting his application through letter dated 13-9-1993 is without lawful authority and cannot be upheld. Accordingly writ petition is accepted with no order as to costs.