New Delhi, Sept 10 - Uttar Pradesh Thursday moved the Supreme Court challenging an Allahabad High Court order that scrapped the result of the preliminary test of the state's civil services examination for 2007.

The state government contended that the high court ruling has not merely brought the entire three-stage selection process of its civil services for the year to a naught but has also cast a doubt over the legality of the results of various other examinations for state jobs.

The high court Aug 30 scrapped the exam result, ruling that the introduction of quota for Dalit and backward category candidates at the stage of preliminary examination itself was not legally justified.

A division bench of Justice Amitav Lala and Justice Umanath Singh also asked the state government to conduct the examination afresh within a month.

The high court's order came on a lawsuit by a candidate, Dhananjay Singh, who had challenged the state government rule for quotas.

Singh had pointed out that to provide reservation to Dalit and backward category students, the Uttar Pradesh Public Service Commission had changed its rule for holding preliminary tests for the state's civil services examination for 2007.

He said that to provide the quota, the commission had fixed different cut-off marks for different categories of candidates.