SHUBHANGI SHIFA
Ranchi, Nov 7: The position of chairman at the Jharkhand Education Tribunal has been vacant since December 13, 2021. As a result, all cases from all over the state related to education, teachers and even students are pending.
Along with this, the tribunal officials are also facing trouble internally in the absence of a chairman. The working employees have not received their salaries and even the equipment and machines are not being taken care of.
The employees have not received salaries in the past 11 months. These employees were appointed on contract in 2007. The employees continued to work for 12 years on honorarium. However, on February 5, 2018, citing the rules, their appointments were declared irregular and now they are paid ? 359 per day. Meanwhile, they are not given salaries for Sundays and other holidays. The employees in the tribunal claim that they are being treated as daily wage workers.
On the other hand, a total of 15 cases are pending because of a missing chairperson. These include issues including termination, appointment, salary due and extension among others.
Notably, after the completion of the term of the former chairman, K Vidyasagar last year, no new chairman has been appointed so far. The Jharkhand High Court has also expressed concern over this earlier.
An official at the state Department of School Education and Literacy on the condition of not being named said, “The post of the chairman of the tribunal has been vacant since December 13 last year after the tenure of Vidyasagar, a retired Indian Administrative Service officer, ended. Earlier, the post of its administrative member was vacant for almost a year.”
He further added, “The education department had invited applications to fill the posts of both the posts including chairman and administrative member in the month of July last year itself. After not receiving the applications of eligible candidates for the appointment of members, the date of submission of the application was extended till September 15, 2021. Even after this, the appointment could not be done.”
Notably, retired judges or retired officers of the Indian Administrative Service having a law degree can only be appointed as chairmen at the Tribunal. At the same time, for appointment to the post of administrative member, the candidate should have experience of working at the level of Additional Secretary in the Central or State Government. Similarly, for an academician member, the experience of working as a Vice-Chancellor or Professor for five years in a University or 15 years in State Education Service Class-I is required.
