If any employee is over-qualified, and have hidden this fact while joining the company, then that employees can be fired from the job.
This has been confirmed by the Supreme Court, as they allowed Punjab National Bank to fire an employee on the same ground.
What exactly happened here?
Supreme Court: Overqualified Employees Should Be Fired
In an interesting case coming from Odisha, a peon joined Punjab National Bank, and hid the fact that he is overqualified.
The job required non-graduate candidate, but a graduate named Amit Kumar Das applied for the job and was selected.
Even after joining the duty, he hid the fact that he is a graduate.
When PNB found this they fired the peon, and a case was filed first at Odisha High Court, and then at Supreme Court.
A bench of Justices Ashok Bhushan, R Subhash Reddy and M R Shah at the Supreme Court sided with the bank, and have allowed them to fire Amit Kumar Das, since he suppressed critical information about his qualification.
Initially, Odisha High Cout had allowed Amit to continue work, but Supreme Court over-ruled this order, and asked the bank to terminate the services of Amit.
The Supreme Court observed that Amit “deliberately, wilfully and intentionally suppressed the fact that he was a graduate, the High Court has erred in directing the appellant Bank to allow the respondent – original writ petitioner – to discharge his duties as a peon.”
Hiding Educational Qualification Not Fair: Supreme Court
In their judgement, the apex court obseved that when PNB had cleasrly mentioned the job requirement via their advertisements, there is no reason why a candidate will hide the facts.
Since PNB didn;t wanted a graduate for peon job, Amit should have informed the same during the initial screening and after joining duties.
The Supreme Court said, “An employee is expected to give correct information as to his qualification. The original writ petitioner failed to do so. He was, in fact, overqualified and therefore ineligible to apply for the job.”
As per the Court, by this “mischievous act” of Amit, a deserving candidate lost the opportumity to get this job.
This can judgement can have far-reaching consequences, since every company and organization can now fire over-qualified employees, who have hidden their accomplishments and qualifications.
We will keep you updated, as more details come in.
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