The Ram Janmabhoomi case being heard by Supreme Court (SC) is creating impediment in the way of appointment of teachers in the vacant posts of Government schools in Uttarakhand. The case of the guest teachers of Uttarakhand is pending before a Bench headed by Chief Justice of India (CJI) Ranjan Gogoi. As a constitutional Bench of SC consisting of five judges headed by the CJI is engaged in a day-to-day hearing of the politically sensitive Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid land dispute case, the case of Guest teachers of Uttarakhand is not getting listed for hearing. The Uttarakhand Government was hoping that the SC would give it a go ahead for the recruitment of guest teachers till the permanent teachers are appointed in thousands of vacant posts of Lecturers and Lecturer Teachers (LT) but the daily hearing of the Ram Janmabhoomi case is not allowing it the space to put its plea before the court. Incidentally, CJI Gogoi is superannuating on November 17 and considering the sensitiveness of the Ayodhya case, it is now unlikely that he would get a chance to hear the guest teacher issue.

In such a scenario, the education department is planning to file a plea for transfer of case to another Bench of SC.

The school education secretary, R Meenakshi Sundaram, confirmed that the Ayodhya case hearing has resulted in halting of the recruitment of teachers in the State.

He added that since the process of promotions has been stopped by the State Government, the department is unable to fill the vacant posts by the promotions.

It is pertinent to mention that 50 per cent of the vacant posts of LTs and lecturers in Government schools of the State are filled by the promotions.

The State Government had issued a ban on promotions last month till the final judgement of High Court (HC) on the issue is delivered.  

More than 5,000 posts of LT and lecturers are at present lying vacant in the Government schools of the State.

As the process of permanent appointments is time consuming, the State Cabinet decided to fill these posts by guest faculty as an immediate though temporary measure to provide teachers in schools.

However, some of the former guest teachers challenged the new drive in the SC which issued a stay on the appointment of guest teachers. The issue is  pending before the SC since then.

The education department is now hoping that their case would be transferred to some other bench.