ASWINI KUMAR DAS Vs. STATE OF ASSAM

JUDGEMENT

(1.) In this writ petition, the petitioner, who claims to be a school teacher under the Bodo Territorial Council, is seeking payment of salary from July, 2006, when it was stopped abruptly by the BTC.

(2.) The case of the petitioner is that pursuant to the advertisement issued by the Director of Elementary Education, Assam, in the year 1999, he applied for the post of Assistant Teacher of LP/ME/MV/MEM, etc. He was selected for the post by the Sub-Divisional Advisory Board, B.A.C. whereafter the Deputy Inspector of Schools, Nalbari vide his order dated 4.12.1999 appointed him as stipendiary Assistant Teacher and posted him at No. 1 Kawli L.P. School. He joined the post on 6.12.1999. He was subsequently transferred to No. 2 Bhehbari L.P. School under Baksa Mushalpur Block vide the order dated 31.12.2005 by the Deputy Inspector of Schools, Nalbari. He joined the post in the month of January, 2006. He received his salary up to the month of June, 2006, but from July 2006, no salary has been paid to him till now even though he has since then been discharging his duty at No. 2 Beharbari L.P. School. It is also the case of the petitioner that the respondent authorities opened GPF account in his name in the year 2004 and deducted his subscription from his salary. A number of representations have been made before the respondent authorities for releasing his salary from July, 2006, but without any positive response from them which prompted him to file this writ petition.

(3.) The writ petition is opposed by the respondent authorities, who filed their affidavit-in-opposition through the Director of Education, BTC (respondent 3). The answering respondents refute the case of the petitioner that he was ever appointed as Assistant Teacher of No. 1 Kawli L.P. School and assert that there is no record of any advertisement published by the respondent authority inviting application from interested person to fill up the posts of Assistant Teacher or of receiving any such applications or call letters issued by the competent authority. It is pointed out by the answering respondents that the petitioner was given a regular time scale of pay by the Deputy Inspector of Schools, Nalbari against one vacancy of Haricharan Deka under Kadamtala L.P. School, which clearly shows that the appointment order was issued illegally. It is also pointed out that the appointments made under OBB Scheme were allowed to draw a regular pay scale only in 2009-10 in compliance with the orders of this Court. The petitioner was shown to be transferred with post to BTC area by the Deputy Inspector of Schools, Nalbari but an incumbent cannot be transferred with post. In the year 2006, financial powers were devolved upon BTC for disbursement of salary, but, on enquiry, it was found that a large number of teachers were working against non-sanctioned and non-existent posts and, in spite of this, were claiming salary. The BTC immediately stopped payment of salaries to all such appointees and took steps to terminate them from service. Furthermore, the last pay certificate annexed by the petitioner at Annexure-9 indicates that he received his salary only up to 31.12.2005 and not up to July, 2006. The petitioner is unable to substantiate his claim by any documents. His writ petition also suffers from laches as he approached this Court only after 6 long years and is, therefore, liable to be dismissed. An additional affidavit was filed by the respondent No. 3 enclosing the certificate dated 12-10-2012 issued by one Panchachandra Das, the Head Teacher of No. 2 Beharbari L.P. School certifying that no other teacher is working in his school and that no certificate had been issued by him to indicate that any other teacher is working in that school. To rebut the contents of the additional affidavit filed by the respondent No. 3, the petitioner also filed another affidavit enclosing the certificate issued by the same Teacher certifying that the petitioner has been working as Teacher at his school since 2006 and that he requested the respondent authorities to release his salary.