The Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld the Jharkhand High Court order, cancelling the employment policy of the State of Jharkhand, in relation to the appointment process of teachers in 13 Scheduled districts of the state.
A Bench headed by Justice M.R. Shah, while upholding the order of the Jharkhand High Court in the matter, ordered to issue the merit list again.
The Apex Court further directed that the merit list should be prepared at the state level, instead of district level.
The Jharkhand government and successful candidates of the Scheduled districts had challenged the order of the Jharkhand High Court in the Supreme Court.
In 2016, the Jharkhand government had come out with a recruitment policy, to fill the vacancies of third and fourth grade posts. A provision had been made in the policy to appoint residents of only that particular Scheduled district for 10 years, for which applications were being filed.
Under this policy, people from non-Scheduled districts were not even allowed to apply. This policy of the state government was challenged in the High Court.
The petitioner told the High Court that this recruitment policy of the state government was not correct, as it violated the right to equality. With this decision of the government, all the posts have been reserved only for the people of a particular district, it added.
As per the Constitution, no post can be reserved 100 per cent. Apart from this, it was said in the petition that due to this policy of the government, the people of the state are being deprived of the right of job in their own state.
The Jharkhand High Court, in its verdict on September 21, 2020, had set aside this recruitment policy of the state.
The state government had challenged this order of the High Court in the Supreme Court.