RAM AUTAR SINGH Vs. STATE OF BIHAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The Petitioners in all these writ petitions are teachers of taken over schools and challenge the order of the Director, Primary Education, Government of Bihar dated 06.03.1998. By the aforesaid order, the Director has held that the Petitioners were wrongly granted first time bound promotion from the date much earlier than the due date. Thus, the question arises is what is the due date for reckoning the date for grant of first time bound promotion.

(2.) The facts are not in dispute. The Petitioners were appointed as teachers by the Private Managing Committee of different schools undisputedly prior to 01.01.1971. As per the prevalent law, even though, they were appointed by Private Managing Committee, their appointments had to be approved by the District Superintendent of Education (D.S.E.). It is not in dispute that their appointments were approved in 1972/73 on various dates. At that time there existed basically three types of schools. The first were schools run by the Government. The other were schools run by the local self Government like the Municipality, the District Boards and the third were private schools. It appears that with effect from 01.01.1971 large numbers of schools which were either run by the local self Government or were private were taken over. Subsequently, in 1981 pursuant to the recommendations of the Pay Revision Committee and the Finance Commission, which was accepted by the Government, was made with regard to grant of time bound promotion to Government employees. Basically, this was an ante stagnation measure where people otherwise qualified for promotion but could not get promotions because of lack of posts at promotional level and had completed 10 years of service, as such, were granted notional promotions with effective pay enhancement. Once this came up the question arose with regard to implementation of first time bound promotion in respect of teachers of schools that were taken over with effect from 01.01.1971. The matter was ultimately settled by Government decision and a trade agreement between the teachers and the Government wherein so far as the schools run by local self Government were concerned, their teachers given the services of those were recognized for the purposes of time bound promotion from the date they were appointed which could be prior to 01.01.1971, but so far as other teachers were concerned, of the private schools, it was decided that it would be 01.01.1971 or date of approval of their services whichever is later and, as such, the date of initial appointment by Managing Committee became irrelevant.

(3.) It is not in dispute that the schools of the Petitioners was not taken over in the first phase. They came to this Court. This Court directed Government to reconsider the matter. Upon reconsideration of the matter, it is not in dispute that the schools of the Petitioners and their services were taken over by the Government with effect from 14.07.1988. Apparently, consistent with the policy decision of the Government of granting of first time bound promotions as Petitioners' services had been approved by the D.S.E., as noted above, in the year 1972/73 and, thus, they had become entitled to first time bound promotion way back they were granted first time bound promotion with effect from 14.09.1989, which was approved by the Finance Department of Government of Bihar as well. In 1997 and to be precise under Memo No. 1394 dated 24.04.1997 this time bound promotion as granted to them with effect from 1989 was cancelled by the D.S.E., which brought the Petitioners to this Court. This time by judgment and order dated 20.08.1997 in C.W.J.C. No. 4307 of 1997 and analogous cases this Court set aside the impugned order of the D.S.E. and remanded the matter to the Director, Primary Education, Government of Bihar to hear the Petitioners and take fresh decision in accordance with the Government policy. It is pursuant to this order that the impugned order dated 06.03.1998 has been passed by the Director, Primary Education, Government of Bihar, which is impugned in these writ petitions. The Director in the impugned order has said that the mistake had earlier been committed. According to him, the mistake ought to be corrected. He recognized that large numbers of other teachers were enjoying the benefit of time bound promotion except the group of these Petitioners. Yet, he chooses to deprive these Petitioners of this benefit. The ground taken by him is that as per the Government policy and the trade agreement, as noticed earlier, the first time bound promotion was to be granted with effect from 01.01.1971 or approval of services of the teachers, after take over, whichever is later.