ORDER :

The prayer sought for herein is for a writ of mandamus directing the third respondent to treat the period of service i.e. from 28.03.2000 to 31.07.2005 in the fourth respondent School as regularised and to pay the petitioner all backwages and all attendant benefits with 12% p.a. interest or interest on the arrears of backwages as fixed by this Court.

2. The fourth respondent School is a recognised minority Private School where there is a post called Secondary Grade Teacher which became vacant in view of the erstwhile incumbent one K. Mary Mathew retired from service. In the vacancy caused, the petitioner was appointed on 28.03.2000.

3. Though such an appointment was made to the petitioner by the fourth respondent School and continuously from the date of appointment, the petitioner had been working in the fourth respondent School and in this regard, the fourth respondent School had made a request to the official respondents to approve her appointment, no such approval has been given by the official respondents.

4. In this context, the file was forwarded seeking for clarification from the Director of Elementary Education, i.e., the second respondent by the District Elementary Education Officer, the third respondent in Na.Ka.No.3731/A2/2001 dated 28.09.2001, where he has sought for the following clarification:

"Other Language"

5. Earlier, the Assistant Elementary Educational Officer concerned vide his proceedings dated 03.09.2001 addressed to the third respondent by sending the following letter with recommendation.

"Other Language"

6. Despite these communications having been sent by the official respondents, no clarification had been given by the second respondent as sought for by the third respondent and all along the petitioner's file was kept pending and no approval was given.

7. Nevertheless, the petitioner had been continuously working for five years and more at the fourth respondent School where admittedly the fourth respondent School has extracted the work from the petitioner as a Secondary Grade Teacher.

8. Thereafter, at one point of time, since there was no salary paid to the petitioner as the appointment of the petitioner was not approved by the official respondents and in this regard, the fourth respondent School, being an aided School, also had not come forward to pay the salary to the petitioner on their own, the petitioner has left the institution and after having worked in some other State had again returned back to Tamil Nadu and she was selected and appointed as Secondary Grade Teacher in the year 2008 by the State Government in Government School and continuously, thereafter she has been working as such.

9. In this context, it is the grievance of the petitioner that, for the period for which the petitioner worked as a Secondary Grade Teacher at the fourth respondent School, no salary had been paid and the reason for non-payment of salary, according to the fourth respondent School, is that the proposal sent for approval since has not been decided and no clarification as sought for by the third respondent also was given.

10. In this context, it is the further grievance of the petitioner that, either the appointment made to the petitioner in the fourth respondent School in the year 2000 should be approved by the official respondents, accordingly, the teaching grant should be forwarded to the fourth respondent School, who in turn, shall pay the salary to the petitioner or if the official respondents feel that, the petitioner's appointment was irregular or illegal in view of the lack of qualification, according to the rules, as per the official respondents stand, it is for the fourth respondent School to pay the salary for the years worked by the petitioner as admittedly atleast five years, the petitioner had worked in that fourth respondent School and work had been extracted from her.

11. Only in that context, this writ petition was filed in the year 2012 with the aforesaid prayer.

12. Today, when the case is taken up for