SUNITA SHARMA Vs. STATE OF HIMACHAL PRADESH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Leave granted.

(2.) It is the State government's unjustifiable action of keeping the Recruitment and Promotion Rules of Class II Posts (Gazetted) in the School and Inspection Cadre, in the Department of Education, 1980 ('1980 Rules') , in cold storage, and with no regard to them, entering into ad hoc agreements with its employees from time to time which has been responsible for complicating the present dispute and bringing it to this stage. The dispute is between the Headmasters and the School Lecturers with regard to the promotional posts. It is precisely to regulate the claims of the two categories to the promotional posts, that the 1980 Rules were framed. Had these rules been faithfully followed, there would have been no occasion for the various litigations between the two categories with one or the other party approaching the court whenever the State government in disregard of the rules, tried to evolve different sets of arrangements which were favourable to one or the other side as the case may be.

(3.) The admitted facts are that it is the trained graduate teachers who become entitled to the posts of headmasters generally after 20-25 years of service. However, the school lecturers are recruited directly to their posts, the maximum age limit for recruitment being thirty years. The number of the headmasters at present is about 861 whereas that of the school lecturers is about 1806. In the Education Department, there have always been two distinct categories viz. , one of the headmasters and another of the school lecturers.