New Delhi, July 15 -- The Supreme Court on Monday quashed the recruitment process for appointing 1,091 assistant professors and 67 librarians in Punjab's government degree colleges, holding that the selection was not just arbitrary but also appeared driven by "narrow political gains" aimed at garnering electoral advantage. In a stinging indictment of the recruitment exercise carried out by the then Charanjit Singh Channi-led Congress in the run-up to the 2022 Punjab assembly polls, a bench of Justices Sudhanshu Dhulia and K Vinod Chandran said the process undermined fairness and disregarded statutory norms. "The entire process is arbitrary and was followed not in the interest of the state or for the cause of higher education but for narrow political gains," held the court, adding that "the state has miserably failed to justify the departure from the standard norms of the recruitment process." Even though the AAP, which assumed power in Punjab in March 2022, was not responsible for initiating the process, it supported the selection in court, contending that the state was empowered to devise its own recruitment procedures and was not bound to go through the Public Service Commission or adhere strictly to University Grants Commission (UGC) regulations. The apex court, however, rejected these arguments, asserting that Punjab had voluntarily adopted the UGC regulations and was duty-bound to follow them, in addition to abiding by the regulations requiring them to making appointments through the public service commission. The judgment highlights the glaring irregularities in the process, noting that a proposal initially limited to filling 160 assistant professor and 17 librarian posts for newly opened colleges on an urgent basis was arbitrarily expanded to include 931 assistant professor and 50 librarian posts -- vacancies that had already been referred to the Punjab Public Service Commission. "One cannot fail to notice the burning haste with which this entire exercise was undertaken by the powers that be," lamented the court, underlining that the entire process, from issuing the advertisement to distributing appointment letters, was wrapped up in just about two months. It flagged the state's replacement of the UGC-prescribed method of selection, which includes assessment of academic work and interviews, with a single written multiple-choice test. The rationale given by the state was that such a test was more objective and less prone to manipulation. But the court firmly rejected that logic, terming it unacceptable. ".this was not only arbitrary but was done without following due procedure, which vitiates the entire process," it noted. The judges also noted that such haste, especially in disregard of institutional procedures and recommendations, gave rise to a presumption of mala fides. "The executive hegemony in reversing a decision of the Council of Ministers, without reference to the said body, undermines the quality of selection.anything done in undue haste can be termed arbitrary and cannot be condoned in law," it noted. While refraining from making specific findings of malice, the court acknowledged that the recruitment process "was motivated by political exigency in the form of the impending assembly elections in the state of Punjab." The government's decision to bypass the Public Service Commission and the UGC regulations was found to be in blatant violation of principles of fairness and transparency in public appointments. "Impartiality, fairness and recognition of merit while selecting public servants are absolutely necessary in modern democracies," said the court, emphasising that Punjab, having itself adopted the UGC framework, could not suddenly discard it without justification. Upholding the judgment of a single judge of the Punjab and Haryana high court, which had in August 2022 struck down the recruitment, the Supreme Court overturned the HC division bench judgment in September 2024 that had subsequently revived the process. "A gross illegality like the present recruitment cannot be ignored. Even if we ignore the argument of political expediency, we cannot but notice the executive hegemony and lack of qualitative assessment," said the court, directing the state to initiate a fresh recruitment process strictly in line with the 2018 UGC Regulations. The court acknowledged that its decision may cause hardship to the candidates who were appointed through this now-quashed process, but pointed out that the appointments had been challenged even as the process was ongoing and were clearly made subject to court orders....