Chandigarh: A petition has been filed before the Punjab and Haryana high court seeking quashing of the appointments made by the Haryana Staff Selection Commission (HSSC) on 3,206 posts of craft instructors in different trades in view of the recent court order declaring the social-economic criteria in recruitment as illegal.As per the plea, the HSSC had granted additional marks under the socio-economic criteria (now declared unconstitutional) to the shortlisted candidates and hence, the entire selection process should be declared invalid.The matter reached the high court in the wake of a petition filed by Deepak Kumar, a resident of Panipat district and several others. The petition has been listed for July 2 for further hearing.The petitioners have sought directions to quash the selection process, including final result dated Sept 15, 2022, and appointments made in lieu of the advertisement issued in 2019 by the HSSC.According to the petitioners, additional marks were given to the successful candidates illegally, arbitrarily ignoring the settled provision of the law. The petitioners stated that they being fully eligible for the advertised posts of craft instructors in different trades had applied against the advertised posts. They said they were issued roll numbers and appeared in the written exam and cleared the same.“But it is unfortunate that despite the petitioners having higher merit in written examination, they were excluded from selection due to socio-economic criteria introduced through different notifications, which in the face of it was illegal, arbitrary and unconstitutional,” the petition had mentioned.The petitioners have also referred to the high court verdict dated May 31 in which a division bench of the HC had quashed the socio-economic criteria for selection.While setting aside the criteria providing additional marks to candidates falling under certain categories, the court had held that rules for recruitments could not be based on political agendas.The court had also held that the socio-economic criteria adopted by the state was violative of the constitutional provisions and sought to create a class of unequal amongst equals. The HC had also held that Haryana had miserably failed to understand the ethos of the provisions of the Constitution. “Once the provisions have been laid down under Article 15 and 16 and under the Directive Principles, the same will apply pan India and the state govt cannot be allowed to introduce special reservations of a nature in public employment where all the citizens are entitled to participate and seek employment,” the court had held.