HC pulls up AAP govt over stand to regularise guest teachers

The Delhi High Court today pulled up the AAP government for insisting to regularise guest teachers in government schools here.
The high court said if guest teachers were competent they will pass the exam conducted for recruiting regular teachers.
A bench of justices Siddharth Mridul and Deepa Sharma questioned Deputy Chief Minister and Education Minister Manish Sisodia, who was present in the court for the hearing, as to why it wanted extra weightage for guest teachers.
The bench said that the appointment of over 9,000 teachers was hanging due to the dispute between the LG and the Delhi government over the fate of guest teachers.

During the hearing, Sisodia said guest teachers have played an important role in transforming government schools and have improved the state of education and their removal will hurt the system.
The court was hearing an appeal by the Delhi government's Department of Education challenging a single bench's order staying the Delhi Subordinate Services Selection Board (DSSSB) notice withdrawing the process for the appointment of 9,000 teachers in government-run schools here.

The division bench also asked Sisodia to meet the LG and resolve the issue.
Advocate Ashok Agarwal, appearing for NGO Social Jurist, questioned the locus of the deputy chief minister in filing the appeal saying he was not personally affected with the single judge's December last year order.

The single judge's order had come on the contempt plea by the NGO, which has alleged deliberate omission in compliance of the court's December 2001 order.
The single judge had asked the authorities to issue a fresh advertisement calling for applications from eligible candidates by December 21, 2017 which shall be received latest by January 31 this year.
The NGO had submitted that by the 2001 order the court had directed the DSSSB to ensure zero vacancy of teachers in Delhi government-run schools on the commencement of each academic year.
It had said that after a high court order of April 11 this year, the DSSSB issued a vacancy notice on August 7 inviting applications from candidates for 8,914 teaching posts in the Directorate of Education of the Delhi government and for 5,906 teaching posts in the three municipal corporation schools here.

The Department of Education, in its appeal filed through Sisodia, had sought setting aside of single judge's December 11 order in which it was said that the court's permission ought to have been sought before issuing the withdrawal notice on August 24.
The government, in its appeal, alleged that the single judge has failed to appreciate that the directions for appointment of teachers in government schools clearly amounts to the court entering the arena of policy making, something ex-facie, unsustainable in law moresoever when the court is exercising a contempt jurisdiction.
The Delhi government had introduced the Board with the purpose of recruiting capable, competent and highly-skilled individuals by conducting written tests, professional tests and personal interviews.