In March last year the Supreme Court had terminated the jobs of 10,323 schoolteachers in Tripura, saying that the recruitment process was “unconstitutional”. The state had thereafter asked for applications to 12,000 posts of non-teachers, counsellors etc (for those with experience).

Debashish Pal Chowdhury, a resident of the state had filed a petition with the court, saying that this recruitment amounted to a contempt of court. However, the state, before the bench of Justices Adarsh Kumar Goel and S Abdul Nazeer contented that this batch of recruitments had no connection whatsoever with the ordered dismissals by the top court.

Speaking to the Kolkata daily The Telegraph, Tripura law secretary Datamohan Jamatia had said that the recruitment process for 12,000 non-teaching posts “did not have any connection to the 10,323 teachers whatsoever.”

The posts are currently under stay order by the Supreme Court following hearing on a case of contempt of court. The state government appealed to vacate the stay order and claimed that the recruitment bid was not connected to 10,323 schoolteachers whose jobs were earlier terminated by the apex court.

On Wednesday (July 4) teh counsel for respondent said: “We have asked for time till 2020. We will try to solve the problem in two years. We will trained more people.”

The matter has been listed for July 18.

– India Legal Bureau