Seema Lal v. The State of Bihar
Case brief
What is this about?
Keywords: RTE Act Section 23; second proviso; untrained teachers termination Bihar; minimum teacher qualification NCTE; NIOS D.El.Ed online course; relaxation upto 31.03.2015; cut-off date 08.08.2021 vs 31.03.2019; retrospective amendment deeming provision; compassionate appointment teachers; deemed continuance from initial appointment; Bihar Panchayat Elementary Teachers Rules 2012; Bihar State Schools Teachers Rules 2023 recruitment; Letters Patent Appeal partly allowed; Patna High Court Full Bench (CJ K. Vinod Chandran, Ashutosh Kumar & Rajiv Roy, JJ.), judgment dated 20-03-2024; precedents engaged: Zile Singh v. State of Haryana (2004) 8 SCC 1 (retrospectivity), St. Aubin v. Attorney General (1951) 2 All ER 473 (deeming), Devesh Sharma v. Union of India 2023 SCC Online SC 985 (referred).
What did the court decide?
Writ petitions dismissed insofar as the challenge to Section 23; LPAs partly allowed with six operative directions: (1) pre-01.04.2010 appointees who qualified on or before 08.08.2021 entitled to continuance; (2)-(3) withheld results declared or certificates published before 08.08.2021 entail deemed continuance; (4) relaxation-period appointees (01.04.2010-31.03.2015) who qualified by 08.08.2021 deemed continued; (5) unqualified persons appointed after 31.03.2015 to be terminated despite later qualification; (6) those in position on 01.04.2010 and 31.03.2015 who did not qualify before 08.08.2021 stand terminated. Individual representations to be considered by the State Government in light of these directions.