- (1.) On the prayer of the learned advocate representing the alleged contemnor/respondent no. 2, namely, the Commissioner of School Education, Primary Branch, West Bengal, leave granted to effect certain minor corrections in his affidavit, which was affirmed on 14th November, 2017.
(2.) The contempt application arises out of an order dated 26th August, 2015, passed by an earlier Division Bench in MAT 951 of 2015 with AST 91 of 2015 (District Primary School Council, South 24 Parganas & Anr. vs. Dilip Kumar Halder & Ors.). The operative portion of the order dated 26th August, 2015, is setout hereinbelow: - " Therefore, the order in terms of prayer 'A' and 'B' passed by the learned Trial Court is set aside and the Council is directed to maintain 3% quota for the physically challenged and to give appointment to the duly qualified persons from the category of the physically challenged. Considering that the appointment has already been delayed the Council is directed to issue the orders of appointment to the qualified candidates within 8 weeks from date. It is recorded that period of 8 weeks has been granted on the basis of the prayer of the learned advocate for the appellants. The appeal and the application are thus disposed of."
(3.) Subsequently, the present contempt application, being CPAN 380 of 2016, was filed before this Court by the applicants. During the course of hearing of the contempt application, the following order was passed by a Division Bench on 5th April, 2016:- "In a contempt application it is alleged that the Council has failed to carry out the order dated 26th August, 2015. Mr. Vaishya, learned advocate, appearing for the alleged contemnors submitted that the petitioners have themselves disclosed annexure R-2 which is at pages 45-46 of the contempt application which will go to show that the first part of the order has duly been complied with. The next part of the order is to give appointment to the person short listed in annexure R-2 of the contempt application but that 2nd part cannot be complied with unless an approval under rule 10 is obtained from the Director. Rule 10 of the Primary Teachers Recruitment Rules, 2001 provides as follows: " 10. Approval of the panel.- (1) "The panel passed in the meeting of by the Board", shall be sent in triplicate to the Director with all necessary papers for approval. (2) The Director or his authorized officer on receipt of "such panels passed by the Board" shall satisfy himself that the rules and the procedures in this respect have been followed any may approve the panel. Such approval, if made, shall be communicated to the Council immediately, provided that if in the opinion of the Director, there are defects or mistakes in the panel in observing the rules and the procedure, he shall point out the defects and mistakes and ask the Council to rectify the defects and mistakes and to submit the panels to him with correction for approval." In that view of the matter, the Council is directed to forward a copy of this order to the Director since re-designated as Commissioner of School Education. He is directed to consider the question in accordance with law and to communicate his views to the Council within six weeks from the date of communication of this order. In default, the Council shall be entitled to presume that such approval has been granted to them. Let the matter be listed after eight weeks.";