Notice to UPSC, Delhi on plea of five teachers

The Delhi High Court Wednesday issued notice to the UPSC, Delhi government and its education department on a plea filed by five teachers against UPSC's decision to not consider them for appointment as principals in city government schools.

The teachers, approaching the court, contended that last year the Union Public Service Commission had advertised for 58 posts of principals in Delhi government schools and despite fulfilling all the conditions with regard to age, educational qualification and experience as the criteria laid down for the post, they have not been selected.

A division bench of Justice Kailash Gambhir and Justice V.K. Shali sought UPSC's and the government's response by July 10 and asked UPSC to keep five seats vacant.

The plea filed by advocate R.K. Saini stated that these five teachers have passed the written or screening test for short-listing of candidates and were initially declared as "eligible" for being called for interview but under the garb of "further short listing", not called for interviews.

The plea said that instead of calling them, the UPSC issued another supplementary list calling 88 more candidates for interview.

The post required education degree (B.Ed), post graduation degree and an experience of 10 years, said the plea. When they were not called for interview after selection in written test, they approached the UPSC, which informed them that there was an issue regarding experience of 10 years.

It added that UPSC has misinterpreted the clause of experience in different manner by asking 10 years of experience after getting masters degree.

However, the advertisement for the post doesn't state that the 10 years' experience should have been after acquiring masters degree, the plea said. It said the UPSC should consider 10 years of experience in total and not after acquiring the masters degree.

They approached the Central Administrative Tribunal, which, in an interim order, allowed them to appear in the interview but later dismissed their plea refusing to interfere with the UPSC's decision in selection.

The plea was filed by the five teachers who all have more than 10 years of experience in teaching.

Mamta Yadav has 20 years of experience, Pramod Kumar Satyarthi 15 years experience, Satish Kumar 12 years experience, Arvind Kumar has more than 10 years experience and Rakesh Kumar Sorot has 13 years experience in teaching.