A division bench of the Hyderabad High Court comprising Acting Chief Justice Ramesh Ranganthan and Justice Uma Devi on Monday ordered status quo on further implementation of integrated service rules for teachers in Telangana.
These interim orders which would be in force for two weeks were granted in a writ petition filed by the Government Teachers Association through Veera Chary. The teachers challenged the constitutional validity of orders issued in June 2017 by the President. Senior counsel S. Ramachandra Rao, appearing for the petitioners, wondered how the President could issue such an order. He could only direct the State government to issue such rules. This ran against Article 371-D. Teachers working in schools run by local bodies were not holding any ‘civil post’, he submitted.
Teachers working in government schools are localised cadre who stood a chance of promotion to various administrative posts in the education department. Teachers working in schools run by local bodies like panchayat, zilla parishad, and municipalities do not get such promotions. After several decades of agitation, integrated rules were framed and there was litigation. Now, teachers from schools run by local bodies would also get these promotions. Two judgments were delivered by the High Court striking down the earlier unified service rules.
The Supreme Court upheld these decisions. Then, recently, integrated rules were notified after obtaining the consent of the Central government. Counsel appearing for the petitioners said the constitutional amendment had given autonomy to the local bodies and integrated service rules were in violation of this too. The bench heard the arguments for nearly one hour.
Additional Advocate General of Telangana J. Ramachandra Rao said the letter and spirit of earlier judgments had been taken care of and there was no absolute bar on integrated rules. He requested time to file counter. The case would be listed next Monday.
