The State government must “act with a sense of urgency” in a matter related to the large number of sanctioned teaching posts that are lying vacant in schools run by it for visually challenged children and not “put the career of such students in jeopardy” due to the non-availability of teachers, the Madras High Court observed on Tuesday.
Chief Justice S.V. Gangapurwala and Justice D. Bharatha Chakravarthy made the observation, while disposing of a public interest litigation petition that complained about around 50% of the sanctioned posts lying vacant in the special schools run by the State government in 10 different districts.
Advocate General R. Shunmugasundaram told the court that the Directorate for the Welfare of the Differently Abled had initiated the process of recruiting teachers for the special schools and that a request was made to the Teachers Recruitment Board (TRB) to initiate the process of recruiting 90 teachers.
The TRB, in turn, had written to the Directorate seeking certain details before issuing the recruitment notification. The details would be prepared and submitted soon, the A-G said, telling the court that the Directorate had also sent a proposal to the State government for recruiting 36 temporary teachers.
The proposal seeking financial sanction for the recruitment of temporary teachers was under the active consideration of the government, the A-G said. After recording his submissions, the judges made it clear that temporary appointments could only be made as a stop-gap arrangement until the appointment of permanent teachers.
They ordered that the details sought by TRB for the issuance of the recruitment notification must be submitted to it within a month, and thereafter, the process of recruiting permanent teachers for the sanctioned posts must be completed as early as possible.
Advocate P. Pugalendhi had filed the case, highlighting the vacancies in the schools in Tanjavur, Tiruchi, Poonamallee, Salem, Madurai, Pudukottai, Sivaganga, Coimbatore, Dharmapuri, and Cuddalore districts. He said the Poonamalee school did not have a principal, and five other schools did not have a headmaster, despite them being sanctioned posts.
His counsel, M. Radhakrishnan, said the situation was no different with respect to other teaching posts too and contended that a huge number of vacancies would defeat the object of the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education (RTE) Act of 2009 and turn illusory the right to education guaranteed under Article 21A of the Constitution.
