applications for recruitment, inter alia, to the post of Medical Officer/ Research Officer (Unani) with the Department of AYUSH, Ministry of Health & Family Welfare, submitted his application and participated in the process. Admittedly, he was overage by one year and fourteen days. However, he sought age relaxation on the ground that he was serving with the Central Council for Research in Unani Medicine (CCRUM). In this regard, he produced a certificate dated 21.09.2011, which certified that the petitioner had worked as Unani Expert for Traditional Knowledge Digital Library (TKDL) Project implemented at HRDC (CSIR), Ghaziabad and sponsored by the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare. He worked on the said project w.e.f. 19.04.2007 to 09.08.2011. He also placed reliance on another certificate dated 03.07.2012 issued by the CCRUM, which certified that the petitioner worked as Unani Expert on contractual basis between 10.08.2011 to 31.03.2012. The respondents did not accept the said experience certificate as sufficient to grant age relaxation in terms of the relevant clause contained in the advertisement since the said clause specifically required that the service rendered with the Central Government/ UT Government should be on regular basis and not on casual/ ad-hoc/ daily wage basis. Consequently, the candidature of the petitioner was cancelled.
