Court upholds PG teacher selection

Madurai: The Madras high court bench here has ruled that priority given to certain categories during recruitment cannot be treated as reservation and set aside the Sivagangai district education officer’s order, cancelling the appointment of a woman graduate assistant teacher selected under priority. Allowing a petition by K. Geetha, appointed in Keelakottai panchayat union school in Sivagangai district, Justice S. Nagamuthu said the action of the member-secretary of the Teachers’ Recruitment Board, validating cancellation of the appointment, could not be appreciated.

The judge said when two people are equally placed in the priority category, the one who falls within this category will be selected. Though the petitioner was not sponsored under priority category, but under general category, she had produced certificates showing she was entitled for priority as an ex-serviceman’s daughter. “This was rightly considered and the petitioner was selected and appointed.” The judge said the cancellation order will only reflect that the TRB had treated the priority as a reservation, which was not correct. The petitioner’s appointment could not be stated to be illegal or erroneous and, therefore, the impunged order is being set aside, he said.

As cancellation of appointment had already been stayed, the judge directed the officials to regularise her service during the interregnum. The member-secretary contended that Geetha was among the candidates sponsored by the district employment exchange for the post of PG assistant and the certificate verification was conducted by the board, which she had attended and ‘inadvertently’ provisionally been selected.

The Sivagangai district elementary education officer, during certificate verification, found that the priority certificates were not registered in the employment exchange. So, she was not eligible for appointment, he had said.