"Confusing the court": Delhi High Court pulls up State for failing to fill posts reserved for PwD candidates

The Delhi High Court on Monday warned that it will initiate contempt of court proceedings against the Delhi government for its failure to fill the backlog of vacancies for persons with disabilities (PwD) in government departments. 

A Division Bench of Chief Justice Devendra Kumar Upadhyaya and Justice Tushar Rao Gedela noted that it has been nearly three years since the Court passed detailed directions to conduct a special recruitment drive for PwD candidates and fill up vacancies, but the government had done little except filing “confusing affidavits”. 

“Your affidavit is an attempt to confuse the court. You are mixing the ordinary recruitment with the special recruitment drive, where the backlog vacancies were to be filled,” the Court remarked. 

It also pulled up the Delhi government for delay in identifying the number of backlog vacancies to be filled by PwD candidates. 

“More than 12 months you have taken to collect data. All this could have been done easily and you took a year’s time?  We are not on officer A or office B we are on the general callousness,” the Court told the government’s secretary for social welfare. 

The Court then asked the petitioner, a non-profit named National Federation of the Blind, to file a detailed affidavit giving details of the vacancies.

The Court further said that it will initiate contempt of court proceedings against State, if it deems fit.

“Please give us facts and figures, we will issue contempt. Give us a clear picture of what they [government] have misled us on. We are quite cognisance of what they are doing,” the Court said. 

It added that the petitioner shall file the affidavit in two weeks and the government should reply to the same. 

The case will be heard next on February 3, 2026. 

In March 2023, the Delhi High Court had ordered the Delhi government to carry out a special recruitment drive to fill up vacancies reserved for persons with disabilities (PwDs) in various government departments. 

It had noted that there were as many as 1,351 vacancies available under the Direct Recruitment quota for PwD candidates, which includes 356 vacant posts for visually impaired people.

However, later, the petitioner filed an application stating that despite the Court’s directions, the government had failed to act. It sought directions from the court to make the government comply with its directions. 

Senior Advocate SK Rungta appeared for the petitioner.