The West Bengal School Service Commission Act, 1997, superseded the 1995 circular allowing teachers to draw pay according to their higher qualification if they took classes in subjects relevant to such qualification.

Tapen Sen, J.

1. IN this Writ Petition, the Petitioner prays for the issuance of an appropriate writ or a writ of or in the nature of a writ of Mandamus commanding upon the Respondents to change his Teaching Group from Language to Social Science (History) in the Asanda Siksha Niketan , P.O. Lalnagar, Dist. Paschim Medinipur.

2. IN CAN No. 8028 of 2008, the Petitioner has prayed for an interim Order restraining the Respondents (Regional School Service Commission) Western Region, from recommending the name of any candidate for appointment on the vacant post of Assistant Teacher in History in the above mentioned school with a further direction upon the school not to take any steps by way of issuing any appointment letter to any candidate for the post of Assistant Teacher in History (Social Science Group) till disposal of the Writ Petition.

The above Application being CAN No. 8028 of 2008 was taken up on 19.9.2008 by one of us and after hearing, an Order was passed that there shall be an interim Order restraining the Respondent authorities from giving any appointment to the post of Assistant Teacher in the Social Science Group (History) in the said school for a period till 15.12.2008 or until further Order whichever is earlier. Opposition etc. were ordered to be filed and the Application was directed to be listed for hearing two weeks after the Puja Vacation. On 11.12.2008, this Court passed an Order that instead of taking up the matter piecemeal, the main Writ Petition itself be decided as Affidavits filed on behalf of the Respondent Nos. 1 to 4 as well as reply thereto which had also been filed. The matter was then Ordered to be listed on 17th December, 2008 and the interim Order was directed to continue in the meantime. Thereafter, the matter taken up on various dates and lastly, on 17.12.2009 when the case was heard finally and judgment reserved. In the meantime, another Application being CAN No. 10149 of 2008 for vacating the Order dated 19.9.2008 was filed but since no Order appears to have been passed on that Application till now, the same is being dealt with the along with the main Writ Petition as well along with the other CAN No. 8028 of 2008.

3. THE facts as could be gathered from the pleadings are that having obtained his Bachelors Degree with Bengali and English in 1979 as compulsory combinations, from the Calcutta University and having thereafter obtained M.A. in History in 1983 from the University of Calcutta, the Petitioner obtained his B.Ed. Degree in 1987 from the Vidyasagar University. He joined the Asanda Siksha Niketan as an Assistant Teacher on 5.5.1997 in the permanent vacancy declared under Memo No. 726-S dated 13.2.1995. His appointment was approved by a subsequent Memo dated 22.5.1997 and since then, the Petitioner has been functioning on his post.

4. ACCORDING to the Petitioner, although he was appointed in the Language Group, yet he was also appointed Examiner of History by the West Bengal Board of Secondary Education in the year 2006 and in support of such contentions, the Petitioner has relied on Annexure- P2 where he has been shown to be taking History classes.

According to the Petitioner, the only other History Teacher in Social Science namely, one Byomkesh Manna, had retired on 31.12.2007 and as such, the post fell vacant and the School submitted the records before the Additional District Inspector of Schools (SE), Kharagpur who sanctioned the said vacancy and recommended the filling up of the said post with an M.A. (History) with B.Ed. candidate from the general category.

5. ACCORDING to the further case of the Petitioner, since there was no History Teacher, he was assigned to take History classes in addition to the classes in the Language Group. It is his further case that apart from him there are other Assistant Teachers in the Language Group to teach English and the vacancy caused owing to the retirement of Manna, is the 17th post which is meant for a general category candidate as per t