STATE OF WEST BENGAL Vs. SK MANURUDDIN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This judgement shall dispose of both the appeals being APO No. 118 of 2004 and APO No. 184 of 2004, which are identical. The questions being common, the parties have also addressed us jointly. However, for the sake of convenience. we shall first take up APO No.118 of 2004.

(2.) The appeal is filed challenging the judgement passed by the learned Single Judge reviewing his own judgement and thereby holding that the original writ petitioners were entitled to get the approval as the teachers in Madrasah and were also entitled to get the consequent benefits.

(3.) Few facts would help us understand the controversy involved. All the petitioners are claiming to be the teachers and a non-teaching staff in a Madrasah called Satgharah High Madrasah, Bardipara Road, Kolkata. They claimed that they were appointed in this Madrasah to teach 9th and 10th Classes on 30.5.1996. This Madrasah is said to have been started in 1975 but got the recognition as a Junior Madrasah 011 7.3.1996. Thereafter, an application was made to the Government for permission to start the High Madrasah for teaching 9th and 10th Classes in the month of April, 1996. The Madrasah started those Classes of 9th and 10th in anticipation of the permission from the Government and also proceeded to appoint these teachers. Ultimately, with effect from 22.9.2000, the said Madrasah got the recognition as a High Madrasah in the sense that the earlier Junior Madrasah was upgraded as High Madrasah. The petitioners were not getting the approval though they claimed the status of the organizing teachers in this Madrasah and, therefore, they approached the Court by way of a writ petition. Their claim was opposed on the ground that their name was not found in the DLIT inspection made by the Department and, as such, they could not have claimed the status of the organizing teachers. It was also given out to begin with, that there were affidavits filed by the Secretary of the Managing Committee that these teachers were not appointed at all. This inspection seems to have taken place on 18.5.2000. Be that as it may, in their first round of litigation the petitioners succeeded, in the sense that in that writ petition being W.P. No. 3010 of 2000, the learned Single Judge M.H.S. Ansari, J. directed that the writ petition should be treated as a representation and for that purpose the copy of the writ petition should be placed by the writ petitioners before the concerned authorities and, thereafter, an injury should be made by the Director of School Education to find out as to whether the claim of the teachers was justified or not. In pursuance of that, the Director of School Education directed the Assistant Director of School Education to conduct the inquiry who went to the concerned School in February, 2001 and recorded his findings on facts wherein he accepted the fact of the appointment of all the seven writ petitioners. It was seen that separate attendance registers were being maintained for the abovementioned petitioners and it also appeared from the verification of the attendance registers that they were serving continuously since their appointment from 3.5.1996. The attendance registers were also found to have been authenticated by the teacher-in-charge of the said Madrasah and that record was being maintained by the Madrasah management.