Hon’ble Dilip B Bhosale, C.J.—The following questions of law have been referred by a Division Bench of this Court, vide its order dated 3 August 2016, for resolution by the Full Bench:

“(a) Whether the law as laid down by the Division bench of this Court in the case of State of U.P. and others v. Ramesh Chandra Tiwari, is the correct law or not.

(b) Whether the proviso to Rule 29 of Rules, 1981, as it stands on the statute book as on date, admits of extension of service of the teacher of retirement beyond 30th June following the date of retirement or not.

(c) Whether the conscious decision of the State Government in terms of the Government order dated 9.12.2014 providing that the teachers would still retire on 30th June, following the date of retirement can be said to be bad or arbitrary in any manner so as to require issuance of a mandate to the State Government to make the amendments in proviso to Rule 29 of Rules 1981 merely because it has altered the academic session from 1st April of the year to 31st March of the succeeding year.”

2. The Division Bench, while referring the questions, found itself unable to accept the view expressed by another Division Bench of this Court in State of U.P. and others v. Ramesh Chandra Tiwari and others, 2015(8) ADJ 509(DB)(LB). The controversy which stood raised before the Division Bench in Ramesh Chandra Tiwari was, whether the amendment to the academic session as effected by Government Order dated 9 December 2014 would enable Assistant Teachers in primary institutions, whose age of superannuation was to fall between April 1 to March 31, to continue till the end of the session, in light of the proviso appended to Rule 29 of the Uttar Pradesh Basic Education (Teachers) Service Rules, 1981 (for short, ‘the Rules’). It appears that the issue in Ramesh Chandra Tiwari arose on account of the fact that no corresponding amendments had been made to Rule 29 which continued to refer to the academic session with reference to the dates July 1 and June 30 as being the dates of commencement and termination thereof. The issue itself arose in view of the fact that on 9 December 2014, the Government had issued an order which amended the academic session for the year 2015-16 to commence from 1 April 2015 and end on 31 March 2016. This Government Order was subsequently further elaborated upon and clarified by a Government Order dated 8 October 2015. The subsequent Government Order, while maintaining the amendment to the academic session, further held that the Government of Uttar Pradesh was in the process of making necessary amendments in the Rules.

Another aspect, which needs to be taken note of, is that the Government Order dated 8 October 2015 carries a recital to the effect that the Government is in the process of taking steps to amend Rule 29 so as to bring it in tune with the policy decision taken by it, to change the academic session. Before us, it is not disputed that in compliance of the directions contained in Government Orders dated 9 December 2014 and 8 October 2015, the academic session of primary educational institutions has and had, in fact, been changed and they consequently commenced on 1 April 2015 and ended on 31 March 2016. Further, it is also not in dispute that though the Government, in its order dated 8 October 2015, stated that it is in the process of taking steps to amend Rule 29, in fact, it did not amend the proviso appended to Rule 29 of the Rules and Rule 29, as it stood then, continued to remain unamended on the statute book. In this backdrop, the Division Bench, in the instant appeal, after referring to the relevant paragraphs in Ramesh Chandra Tiwari, observed that Ramesh Chandra Tiwari has failed to take note of paragraph 3 of the Government Order dated 9 December 2014, wherein a conscious decision had been taken by the State Government not to make any amendment in the proviso to Rule 29 of the Rules. The Division Bench further observed that the Government Order dated