The Madras High Court dismissed a writ petition filed by P. Karthikeyan challenging the State Bank of India’s decision to cancel his appointment as a Circle Based Officer (CBO) over adverse credit history.
The Court held that SBI was justified in applying Clause 1(E) of the recruitment notification, which disqualifies candidates with poor loan repayment records or negative CIBIL reports. Although the petitioner argued that his loans had been cleared prior to appointment, the Court noted multiple instances of past financial indiscipline, including loan defaults and credit card write-offs. It ruled that eligibility criteria concerning financial integrity are a matter of recruitment policy, especially significant in banking roles, and declined to interfere under Article 226.
The plea of discrimination was also rejected, with the Court observing that similarly placed candidates had met the bank’s specific rectification criteria, which the petitioner had not.
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