The Supreme Court has set aside the termination of three teachers appointed in Jharkhand in 2015, holding that the State acted arbitrarily and in violation of natural justice. The appellants were dismissed from service in October 2016 on the grounds that they had not secured the minimum qualifying marks in their Intermediate examination and had furnished invalid graduation certificates.
A Bench of Justices Dipankar Datta and K.V. Viswanathan observed that the appellants, belonging to the Scheduled Tribe category, were entitled to a 5% relaxation in eligibility marks and had indeed secured the required 40% marks once the vocational subject marks were included in the aggregate, as prescribed on the reverse of their marksheets. The Court held that Rule 21 of the Jharkhand Primary School Teacher Appointment Rules, 2012 which governs preparation of merit lists was wrongly applied by the authorities to determine eligibility. Instead, Rule 4, which specifies the eligibility criteria for appearing in the Teacher Eligibility Test, was applicable and did not exclude vocational subjects.
The Court found that the authorities had changed the basis of termination without issuing fresh show-cause notices, thereby denying the appellants a fair opportunity to respond. Termination orders passed on a ground not contained in the original notices, the Court held, were unsustainable.
Allowing the appeals, the Supreme Court ordered that Appellant 1 and 2 be treated as continuously in service from the date of their original appointment in December 2015, with full arrears of pay and continuity of seniority, though the intervening period would not count for experience-based promotions.
As Appellant No. 3 had passed away in August 2024, the Court directed that his termination be set aside and that his legal heirs receive full arrears of pay up to the date of his death. He shall also be deemed to have died in harness, making his family eligible to seek compassionate appointment under applicable rules.
