NEW DELHI, 10 Mar: The Supreme Court has directed states and union territories (UT) to notify by 28 March the number of sanctioned posts of teachers to educate children with special needs.
A bench of Justices Sudhanshu Dhulia and K Vinod Chandran observed that, despite its 2021 judgement, none of the states or UTs made appointments on such sanctioned posts.
In fact, a large majority of the states didn’t even identify the sanctioned posts required in the states, despite there being figures relating to children with special needs, the court said.
“Each state and UT shall come out with notifications with the number of posts that they have sanctioned for teachers who have to impart education
to children with special needs,” it added.
The 7 March order said that, after the posts are sanctioned and notified preferably within three weeks – on or before 28 March – at least two newspapers “having wide circulation” would carry ads in the respective states, aside from the websites of the education department and the state government concerned.
The bench was hearing a plea filed by Rajneesh Kumar Pandey, through advocate Prashant Shukla, claiming a dearth of special educators in Uttar Pradesh and other states.
The petition, filed by 17 teachers who claim to have undertaken the required training to teach children with special needs, said that to make Right to Education a success, it is essential to appoint qualified professionals in each school to help kids prepare for life challenges.
The top court said that the selection and appointment should be made of qualified or competent or eligible teachers only. It came on record that in several states and union territories, ad hoc contractual teachers are imparting education and conducting classes of such children.
“We have also been informed that in some of the states, these teachers have been continuing for the last 20 years, approximately. For these reasons, the states shall immediately constitute a screening committee,” the bench said.
The committee, the court said, would consist of the state commissioner for persons with disabilities, the education secretary, a nominee of the Rehabilitation Council of India, who is a field expert.
“We make it very clear that in case there is no disability commissioner available in any state, in that case only he/she shall be substituted by the legal representative or its law secretary,” the bench said. (PTI)
