Chandigarh, June 1 -- Observing that a cut-off date for acquiring essential qualifications is a well-established legal principle necessary to ensure certainty, uniformity and fairness in recruitment, the Punjab and Haryana high court dismissed a petition challenging a PSPCL recruitment condition requiring candidates to possess the prescribed qualification by the last date of applications. Justice Harpreet Singh Brar held that the condition could not be termed arbitrary, unreasonable or violative of Articles 14 and 16 of the Constitution. The petition was filed by Manpreet Kaur, who challenged Note (iii) of the eligibility criteria in PSPCL advertisement for recruitment to 622 posts of junior engineer (Electrical). She sought quashing of the condition fixing the last date of online applications as the cut-off date for acquiring the requisite qualification, and requested permission to obtain the qualification by any subsequent stage of the selection process. The petitioner also sought directions to allow her participation in the recruitment process, protection against rejection of her candidature and a decision on her representation seeking clarification regarding the eligibility of candidates whose final results were awaited. PSPCL had issued the recruitment advertisement in April 2026, fixing May 10, 2026, as the last date for submission of online applications. The petitioner submitted that candidates whose results were awaited were permitted to apply, but were required to acquire the prescribed qualification by the application deadline....