T M SREENIVASAN Vs. STATE OF KERALA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The appellant in these appeals filed Original Petitions put forwarding his claim under Note 1 to R.1(1) of Chapter XIVA of Kerala Education Rules. The above note reads as follows:

(2.) The appellant was appointed as a Peon in the fourth respondents school on 3.5.1982. While he was working as a Peon, he obtained TTC certificate also and therefore he became eligible to be appointed as LPSA in April 1996. According to the appellant, since he became eligible to be appointed in the subsequent vacancies, he was entitled to be appointed as a teacher notwithstanding the fact that there are 51A claimants. His claim was rejected by the learned Single Judge mainly following two Division Bench decisions of this Court reported in Reghu v. State of Kerala ( 2000 (2) KLT 29 ) and Krishnan v. Muraleedharan ( 2000 (3) KLT 320 ). It was further contended by the learned counsel appearing for the appellant that the decision reported in Rajendran v. State of Kerala, ( 1993 (1) KLT 893 ) was not considered and also stated that the above Division Bench decisions requires reconsideration. In the above referred decision (1993 (1) KLT 893), in Para.7, it was observed as follows:

(3.) In the above case, the Division Bench was considering the case of a Peon for promotion as Lower Division Clerk and not to the teaching category and was not considering to the post of a teacher against the claim of a 51A claimant who was a previous teacher working in the school. The above decision is therefore not in conflict with other decisions. Those decisions only say that if there is an eligible person to be appointed and promoted as teacher, in view of the specific conditions in Note 1, the subordinate staff will be entitled to promotion, in the absence of eligible teachers. In otherwords, a member of the non teaching staff will get entitlement for appointment as a teacher only in the absence of a teacher eligible for promotion or appointment. In this case, it is not disputed that respondents were appointed in the vacancies occurred after the petitioner attained qualification. Though they were not working as teachers at that point of time, they were teachers and they had 51A claim. Only after satisfying that, the claim of subordinate staff can be considered on the basis of Note 1 to R.1(1). Arijit Pasayat, Chief Justice (as he then was) held in Reghu v. State of Kerala (2000 (2) KLT 29) as follows: