The Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court quashed the appointment of Dr Edwin Joe as the Director of Medical education and issued an order directing Dr S Revwathy to be appointed to the post on Wednesday. The court order stated that Revwathy had been the most eligible among the other candidate since she was the senior most on the Civil Medical List but the concerned authorities had bent the rules by appointing Edwin Joe as the Director claiming he had the 'merit'.
The new appointee, Revwathy had petitioned to the court to seeking her appointment as the Director of Medical Education alleging that the present Director, Edwin Joe been given undue preference over her, despite not being eligible for the post.
In her petition, Revwathy recalled that Dr Geethalakshmi who was the Director in 2016 was directed to form a panel that would select the next Director. Despite being fully eligible, the petitioner claimed that the post was given to Dr Vimala. According to the rules, it is mandatory for the candidate to have a year left in service, but despite Vimala not having a year, she was appointed on the basis on being senior to Revwathy.
While the petition continued to pend in court, the next Director had been appointed. According to the petition, four names were submitted to the panel for consideration- the eligibility of these candidates were mentioned right next to their names, the first (Vimala)- it had been mentioned that she did not have a year's service left. The other two candidates, including Edwin Joe were categorised as eligible, however only next to the petitioners name it has been mentioned that she is a senior in the Civil Medical List.
The petition went on to state that according to the rules of the appointment, it was essential that the candidate had the required experience of teaching as well as administrative duties and the candidate had to be a senior on the Civil Medical List. The panel seemed to have clearly overlooked this rule in this year's appointment.
The defence pointed out that Edwin Joe had been appointed as a Dean of a medical institute earlier than Revwathy and had therefore been more eligible and 'merit' for the post, however the bench refused to accept this argument. Accordingly, the court has directed Revwathy to be immediately appointed as the Director of Medical Education.
