Summary
The Court declined to interfere with the Chhattisgarh High Court's judgment holding B.Ed. qualified candidates ineligible for appointment as primary school teachers. Following Devesh Sharma v. Union of India and its clarification of 08.04.2024, only B.Ed. candidates appointed before 11.08.2023 are protected; these candidates were appointed in September 2023, and their appointments were expressly subject to the outcome of the writ petition.
Issues
- Whether B.Ed. qualified candidates appointed as primary school teachers by Chhattisgarh after the judgment in Devesh Sharma (11.08.2023) were entitled to the protection of its prospective operation.
- Whether Devesh Sharma's observation that B.Ed. candidates ought to have been called while the NCTE notification stood helped candidates who had been called and selected.
- Whether the Chhattisgarh 2019 Rules, which listed B.Ed. as a qualification for Assistant Teacher, could still be applied after Devesh Sharma.
Provisions considered
- Rule 8(II), Schedule III column 5 and Annexure I, Chhattisgarh School Education Services (Educational and Administrative Cadre) Recruitment and Promotion Rules, 2019Rule 8(II) ties the qualification for elementary teachers to the Right to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009, and the Annexure's inclusion of B.Ed. (with a six-month bridge course) followed the NCTE notification of 28.06.2018 that Devesh Sharma quashed. By implication the B.Ed. qualification in the Rules could not be implemented. (¶ 11)
- Qualifications for elementary teachers (as referred to in Rule 8(II)), Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009Noted as the source to which Rule 8(II) of the 2019 Rules refers for the qualification of teachers in primary education. (¶ 11)
Held
- B.Ed. is not a qualification for a primary school teacher. Under the clarification of 08.04.2024, the prospective operation of Devesh Sharma protects only candidates appointed before 11.08.2023 whose appointment was not made subject to the outcome of litigation; mere selection or participation in the process before that date gives no benefit. (¶¶ 3, 10)
- The relevant date is the date of appointment, not the completion of the selection process. The petitioners were appointed in September 2023, after the cut-off, and this Court's order of 29.08.2023 and their appointment orders made their appointments subject to the High Court's decision, so they could claim no protection. (¶¶ 5, 8, 9, 10)
- Devesh Sharma's remark that Rajasthan erred in not calling B.Ed. candidates while the NCTE notification was in force only affirmed that a binding notification could not be ignored until declared invalid; it did not make B.Ed. candidates eligible, and the argument based on it was misconceived. (¶ 10)
- The B.Ed. qualification in the Chhattisgarh 2019 Rules followed the quashed NCTE notification and, by implication, cannot be implemented after Devesh Sharma. Appointments made despite NCTE's communication of 04.09.2023 informing all States of that judgment were illegal and rightly quashed. (¶¶ 11, 12)
Result
Special leave petitions, including the State of Chhattisgarh's, dismissed; the High Court's judgment of 02.04.2024 holding B.Ed. candidates disqualified was upheld.