VIGILANCE MANUAL VOLUME III - AP Online

364 DECISION - 123
does not impair the control which is vested in the High Court under
Art. 235 of Constitution.
(123)
(A) Principles of natural justice — area of operation
Rules of Natural Justice operate only in areas not
covered by statutory rules and they do not supplant
the law but only supplement it.
(B) Principles of natural justice — bias
There must be a reasonable likelihood of bias. Mere
suspicion of bias is not sufficient. Association of
the official with the selection for which he was also
a candidate was violative of the principle that a
person should not be a judge in his own cause.
A.K. Kraipak vs. Union of India,
AIR 1970 SC 150
The petitioners were senior officers of the Forest Department
of the Government of Jammu and Kashmir. They were aggrieved on
the ground that they had been superseded in the matter of selection
for All India Forest Service and that a candidate seeking selection to
the Service, Sri Naqishbund, was a member of the Selection Board
and his name was placed at the top of the list of officers finally
selected. The respondents contended that when his own case was
considered by the Selection Board. Sri Naqishbund dissociated
himself from the proceedings of the Board, but admitted that he
participated in the proceedings when the cases of other officers, who
were his rivals in the matter of selection were being considered and
he was a party to the preparation of list of selected candidates in
order of merit. It was against this background that the question
whether the selection was violative of natural justice and was vitiated
on account of bias against the petitioners was considered.