Indira Nayak vs The Commissioner of Public Instructions Education Department and Others

B.S. Patil, J.—In this writ petition, petitioner is aggrieved by the order dated 14.12.2005 passed by the 1st respondent/Commissioner of Public Instructions vide Annexure-M. By the said order, Commissioner has allowed the appeal filed by respondent No. 5/President, Mahatma Gandhi Vidya Vardhak Sangha, at Hiregutti, of Kumta Taluk, Uttara Kannada district. The President of 5th respondent/Sangha had challenged the order passed by the Director of Public Instructions, Bangalore/respondent No. 2 herein approving the appointment of the petitioner as Hindi Teacher in the 5th respondent/Sangha vide his order dated 23.10.2000. It is necessary to notice certain essential facts leading to this writ petition.

The undisputed facts are that petitioner was appointed as a Hindi Teacher in the 5th respondent/Sangha on 15.11.1995. The 5th respondent/Sangha sought for approval of appointment of the petitioner and in this regard forwarded the proposal to the Deputy Director of Public Instructions/respondent No. 4 herein. The Deputy Director rejected the request on 24.07.1996 stating that appointment of the petitioner was made in violation of the roster system disregarding the fact that the post was reserved for Scheduled Caste/Scheduled Tribe. Aggrieved by this, petitioner filed a writ petition in W.P. No. 22668/1996. This Court dismissed the writ petition reserving liberty to the petitioner to file an appeal. Accordingly, petitioner filed an appeal before the Director of Public Instructions, Bangalore. The Director of Public Instructions passed an order on 27.11.1999 holding that the Management had unnecessarily harassed the petitioner, as the post of Hindi Teacher being a single post could not have been filled up by reserving the same in favour of any reserved category. Thus, a direction was issued to the Joint Director of Public Instructions to approve the appointment of the petitioner from the date of passing of the order by the Director of Public Instructions.

This order was challenged by the President of Sangha before the Commissioner for Public Instructions. The Commissioner for Public Instructions allowed the appeal by setting aside the order passed by the Director of Public Instructions. This was challenged by the petitioner in W.P. No. 36597/2000. This Court allowed the writ petition on 10.03.2005 and remanded the matter for fresh consideration by providing opportunity to both parties. Thereafter, petitioner herein filed objections before the Commissioner of Public Instructions. He has specifically raised the question of maintainability of the appeal at the instance of President of the Sangha before the Commissioner of Public Instructions against the order passed by the Director of Public Instructions apart from raising several other questions on merit. The Commissioner of Public Instructions has passed the impugned order allowing the appeal and setting aside the order directing approval of the appointment of the petitioner passed by the Director of Public Instructions. In this background, the present writ petition is filed.

I have heard learned counsel for both parties who have taken me through the pleadings and the orders annexed to the writ petition including the impugned order.

A perusal of the impugned order discloses that the Commissioner of Public Instructions has not applied his mind to the various contentions raised before him and he has not examined the maintainability of the appeal before him at the instance of President of the Sangha. He has also not examined whether the post of Hindi Teacher was required to be reserved for being filled up by appointing a candidate belonging to Scheduled Caste/Scheduled Tribe.

First of all, as rightly contended by Sri V.P. Kulkarni, learned counsel for the petitioner who has placed reliance on the judgment of the Apex Court in the case of Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research, Chandigarh Vs. Faculty Association and Others, (1998) 4 AD 70 : AIR 1998 SC 1767 : (1998) 3 CTC 413 : (1998) 3 JT 223 : (1998) 2 SCALE 772 : (1998) 4 SCC 1 : (1998) SCC(L&S) 961 : (1998) 2 SCR 845 : (1998) AIRSCW 1553 : (1998) 4 Supreme 110 as the Director of Public Instructions had issued a direction to accord approval of appointment of the petitioner as Hindi Teacher pursuant to the very recommendation made by the Management of the 5th respondent/Sangha, it was not at all open for the 5th respondent or for that matter to the President of the 5th respondent to challenge the order passed by the Director of Public Instructions.

The Director of Public Instructions has examined the matter on merits and has come to the conclusion that the post of Hindi Teacher being a single post in the cader of Hindi Teachers in the school could not have been reserved for Scheduled Caste/Scheduled Tribe. He has taken note of the fact that petitioner was harassed for several years for no fault on her part by refusing approval of her appointment. When the order passed by the Director of Public Instructions was for the benefit of Sangha which had appointed the teacher and at whose instance, the proposal was sent for approval of the teacher, it is unconceivable how an appeal could be maintained by the Sangha and how could it feel aggrieved by the order passed by the Director. Apparently, the appeal was filed for extraneous considerations. The Commissioner of Public Instructions ought not to have entertained such an appeal filed by a person who was not aggrieved and who had no locus-standi to maintain the same. In addition, the Commissioner of Public Instructions has not even examined the other legal questions as to whether a single post in the cader could be the subject matter of reservation. Thus, looked from any angle, order passed by the Commissioner of Public Instructions which is cryptic, cannot be sustained.

Therefore, this writ petition deserves to be allowed. Accordingly, it is allowed. The impugned order passed by the Commissioner of Public Instructions is set aside and the order passed by the Director of Public Instructions is restored.