Teachers can be assigned election duties only minimally and outside teaching hours to uphold the Right to Education.

JUDGMENT :

Ajay Bhanot, J.

1.The judgement is being structured in the following conceptual framework to facilitate the discussion:

A. Introduction

2. By the impugned order dated 16.08.2024 the petitioner has been directed to discharge election duties as a Booth Level Officer.

B. Submissions of learned counsels

3. Learned counsel for the petitioner Shri Satyendra Chandra Tripathi has made the following contentions:-

i) The election duties which are assigned to the petitioner will interfere in the functioning of the petitioner as an Assistant Teacher.

ii) The work of a Booth Level Officer is of a continuous nature and there will be no let up in the election duties.

iii) The appointment of the petitioner on election duties is in the teeth of Right to Education Act, 2009 and the judgment rendered by this Court in Sunita Sharma Advocate High Court and Another Vs. State of U.P. and others, PIL No. 11028 of 2015 decided on 25.03.2015.

(iv) Deployment of the petitioner on election duties is contrary to the provisions of Right to Education Act, 2009 and will interfere with his teaching work.

(v) The aforesaid appointment is also dehors the relevant Election Commission Guidelines for appointment of teachers on election duties.

4. Learned Standing Counsel and Shri Jitendra Ojha, learned counsel for the Election Commission of India contend that:-

(i) The appointment of the petitioner as Booth Level Officer is in consonance with the Right to Education Act, 2009 and the Election Commission Rules in that regard. The election duties which are allocated to the petitioner will not impact his teaching duties.

(ii) Reliance was placed on the judgment rendered by this Court in Nirbhay Singh and others vs. State of U.P. and others, Writ A No. 26204 of 2021 decided on 11.08.2022.

5. Heard learned counsels for the parties.

C. Facts

6. Admitted facts which are relevant for the adjudication of the controversy are these:

The petitioner is an Assistant Teacher in a primary school. The petitioner has been appointed as a Booth Level Officer by the order dated 16.08.2024, and has been allocated election related duties like revision of electoral rolls of the voters for the State Legislative Assembly Elections. The duties so allocated do not appear to be an episodic engagement. The said election duties envisage a long drawn if not a perennial commitment.

D. Issues arising for determination:

7. The issue that arises for consideration in the facts and circumstances of this case and other companion writ petitions is the scope of applicable election guidelines for appointing teachers holding field on election duties and the manner of their implementation.

E. Right to Education and Consequences of allocation of election duties to teachers: Case Laws

8. The issue of deployment of teachers for election duties was examined by constitutional courts on many occasions.

9. The apparent incompatibility between the fundamental right of education vested in children, and the paramount importance of electoral process in a democratic country resulting from assignment of election duties to teachers arose for consideration before the Supreme Court in Election Commission of India vs. St. Mary's School, AIR 2008 SC 655 . Reconciling the apparently divergent demands St. Mary's School (supra) set forth the law in the following terms:

"27. The provisions of the 1950 and 1951 Acts although