Calcutta High Court (Appellete Side)
Ac Debjani Bose vs State Of West Bengal & Ors on 13 June, 2012
Author: Harish Tandon
Bench: Harish Tandon
1 Court 13.6.12 W.P. 16252 (W) of 2007 No. 3 Sl 37 Ac Debjani Bose
-vs-
State of West Bengal & Ors
Mr. Ekramul Bari
Ms. Tanuja Basak ... For Petitioner
Mr. Kalyan Kumar Chakraborty
Ms. Sharmila Deb ... For Council
Mr. Khairul Alam ... For State
The petitioner has challenged the Memo No. 328/IC dated 4th May 2007 issued by the Chairman, District Primary School Council, Uttar Dinajpur whereby and whereunder an application filed by the petitioner seeking appointment on compassionate ground is rejected.
Petitioner being the married daughter and her husband being a private tutor and a small businessman is the ground assigned for rejection of the said application.
It is further observed that the petitioner was also getting financial benefit, including the pension of the deceased teacher.
Admittedly, the teacher died while in service on 19th December 2003. Statutory Rules prevalent at the time of his death requires an application to be made within two years from the date of death which, in fact, was filed within the said prescribed period. It would be apposite to quote Rule 14 (1) of the West Bengal Primary School Teachers Recruitment Rules, 2001 which runs as follows :
2"14. Appointment on compassionate ground-
(1) when a teacher dies in harness before the date of his superannuation i.e. at age of 60 years, leaving a family which, in the opinion of the Council, is in extreme financial hardship that is it fails to provide two square meals and other essentials to the surviving members of the deceased teacher's family, the following members of the deceased teacher's family, viz. The (a) widowed wife, or (b) widower, or (c) divorcee dependent daughter-divorced before the date of death of the teacher.
Possessing required education qualifications as laid down in Clause (a) and (c) of sub rule (1) of rule 6 an unemployed and not below 18 years of age and not above 45 years of age and found eligible to teach, may make within two years from the date3 of such death, a prayer in writing to the Council for appointment as primary teacher on compassionate ground, provided that only one member of a deceased primary teacher's family may be appointed on compassionate ground."
First ground, which is taken for rejection of the said application, is that the petitioner is married daughter.
Whether married daughter could be excluded and discriminated with the unmarried daughter for giving appointment on compassionate ground, the matter came up before this Court in case of Smt. Usha Singh -vs- The State of West Bengal & Others, reported in 2003 (1) CLJ 407, where it has been held that restricting eligibility for 3 appointment under 'Died-in-Harness' category to unmarried daughter only offends Articles 14 and 15 of the Constitution and has struck down the word 'Unmarried' from Rule 14 of the Statutory Rules.
The authority should not have rejected the application merely on the ground that the petitioner is married as it offends equality doctrine being the basic structure of the Constitution of India. One time financial benefit on account of gratuity cannot be said to be sufficient to cater the day to day need. Furthermore, payment of retiral benefit cannot be treated the family to be financially sound.
The authority, before arriving at the finding relating to financial status of family, should have made an independent enquiry. It further appears that the said authority did not record his satisfaction as to the financial status of the family of the deceased and was merely swayed by the fact that the petitioner is married.
There is no material produced before the Court wherefrom it could be safely gathered that the husband of the petitioner is a private tutor and a small businessman; whereas in the application, filed by the petitioner, she has specifically stated that her husband is unemployed. The authority has proceeded to decide the matter without considering the same in its true and proper perspective.
The impugned Memo is, therefore, quashed and set aside.
The Chairman, District Primary School Council, Uttar Dinajpur is hereby directed to consider the 4 application of the petitioner afresh and shall dispose of the same by a reasoned order within eight weeks from date, in accordance with law.
The writ application, is, thus, allowed. However, there will be no order as to costs.
Urgent photostat certified copy be supplied to the parties, if applied for, on priority basis.
(Harish Tandon, J.)