Kolkata, Aug 18 (PTI) The Calcutta High Court on Tuesday said there was a lack of coordination between the West Bengal government and the Centre over the work schedule for teachers assigned Census duty and asserted that a balance must be struck between the enumeration work and school duties.
Hearing petitions over assigning census duty to school teachers, Justice Krishna Rao noted that while the Census authority has fixed 9 am to 4 pm for census work, the state government says teachers will carry out the tasks after school hours and on weekends.
The state’s counsel argued that it has an obligation under the Right to Education Act and teachers cannot forgo classes.
At this, a visibly annoyed Justice Rao said there is no cooperation between the Centre and the state government. The state is yet to provide the court with data on how many teachers and non-teachers have been assigned census duty, he added.
Justice Rao said a balance needs to be achieved between teachers’ census work and school duties.
Additional Solicitor General Dhiraj Trivedi, representing the Census authority, told the court that it wants officials from the state government for one month for the census work and it was not an issue whether they were from municipalities or schools.
In case teachers are deployed as census officers, a particular plan has to be carved out since the work schedule is clashing with school hours, which are generally from 10 am to 4 pm, Trivedi said.
The Census authority has set 9 am to 4 pm as the timing for doing the census work.
To a query by the court, Trivedi said that although the target is to complete the census work in one month, it can be extended if required.
The court adjourned the hearing in the matter till Wednesday on a prayer by the state government’s counsel, who said he needs to get instructions from the authorities. PTI AMR NSD
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