KUNJALATA GOGOI & 11 OTHERS, BANGSHIDHAR NARAH & ANOTHER, MILESWAR BARUAH & 3 OTHERS AND HEMANTI BALA BARUA & 11 OTHERS Vs. STATE OF ASSAM & OTHERS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) These four writ petitions raise unusual questions of fact and law. The petitioners who are thirty in number are honorary teachers working in Lower Primary Schools in the Dhemaji District of Assam without any salary or honorarium. It is difficult to define and not difficult to imagine what honorary teachers are. Such teachers attend schools regularly to teach their pupils. Parents of their pupils remunerate them in some measure. What their perks are pose another difficulty to state but can be imagined. The honorary teacher is analogous to a German lecturer who is referred as privato decent. The Oxford Dictionary sets out the meaning as 'private teacher or lecturer recognised by University but not on salaried staff'.

(2.) In Civil Rule No. 1637 of 1989 there are 12 petitioners, in Civil Rule No. 1638 of 1989 there are two, in Civil Rule No. 1748 of 1989 there are four and in Civil Rule No.1926 of 1989 there are 12 petitioners. Some among the petitioners were working for more than five years, more seven years and a few are working for more than 10 years. The thirty petitioners are working in Dhemaji Sub-Division now a district. Among them fifteen persons have had secured appointment orders. In the first writ petition, petitioners 1, 2, 6, 8, 11 and 12 have had an order of appointment as Assistant Teachers in Primary Schools on honorary basis, in Civil Rule No.1638 of 1989, one among the two petitioners had secured such an order, in Civil Rule No. 1748 of 1989, petitioners 3 and 4 out of the four petitioners have had an order of that nature in their favour and in Civil Rule No. 1926 of 1989 petitioners 1, 6, 7, 8, 9 and 11 had secured such orders. The order reads as under : (Translated Copy) Govt. Of Assam Office of the Deputy Inspector of Schools, Dhemaji. ORDER

(3.) In view of the fact that no salary was paid to the petitioners who hold no rights accrued to the petitioners by virtue of the above order.