No Point Of Philanthropic Activities When Teachers And Staff Not Given Rightful Dues: Delhi HC Holds DSGMC President, General Secretary Guilty Of Contempt
|The Delhi High Court has found Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee (DSGMC), President and the General Secretary guilty of contempt for not paying teachers and the staff of the Guru Harkrishan Public School (GHPS) their salaries.
Consequentially the Court directed that the rent received, from any source whatsoever, by the GHPS (ND) Society, its schools, and/or DSGMC shall stand attached and shall be utilised only for the purpose of clearing the arrears of the 6th and the 7th CPC owed to the employees of the twelve schools managed by the GHPS (ND) Society.
Further, the Court withheld the salary and other financial perquisites of the Members of the GHPS (ND) Society and the DSGMC till further orders or till the entire dues of the employees, teaching and non-teaching staff, of the schools are fully paid
A bench of Justice Navin Chawla observed, “The financial incapacity to clear the arrears and pay even the current dues, as pleaded by the respondents, only strengthens the belief of this Court that there is gross mis-management of the affairs of the schools, GHPS (ND) Society, and to some extent, even of the DSGMC. The religion of Sikhism preaches the ideals of honesty, compassion, humanity, humility, and generosity in everyday life. While there is no doubt that various philanthropic and charitable causes are being discharged by the community and its leaders, at the same time, it should be kept in mind that ‘charity begins at home”.
“…There is no point of such philanthropic activities and values when its own teachers and staff of the schools, who are helping to lay down the foundation of a good and progressive society by imparting education and instilling moral values to young students and helping in running the said institutions, are ill-treated and not given their rightful dues, on the other hand are rather made to suffer the agony of approaching this Court repeatedly for the same”, the bench had further noted.
Senior Advocate Mohit Mathur appeared for the petitioners and Senior Advocates I.S. Alag and Kirti Uppal appeared for the respondents.
In the present batch of petitions, petitioners highlighted the wilful and deliberate non-compliance by the respondents of the judgment and order dated November 16, 2021 passed by the Court inter alia in Shikha Sharma v. Guru Harkrishan Public School & Ors.
Pursuant to which, the Department of Education (DoE), in compliance with the judgment, directed the Governing Body of GHPS, to pay the Travel Allowance and the Dearness Allowance as per the 6th and 7th Pay Commission.
Earlier, as the court ran out of its patience, through an order dated June 1, 2023 the respondents to be prima facie guilty of contempt and also directed the DoE to take a decision on appointing an Administrator or de-recognize the school. Pursuant to which, the DoE issued a notice to the schools and the GHPS (ND) Society to Show Cause as to why the schools should not be de-recognized.
“I have in extenso detailed the above orders only in order to show that this Court, including the Division Bench of this Court, has been extending repeated opportunities to the respondents to purge their contempt and to pay the legitimate and legal dues of its employees, including the teachers. The helpless employees and teachers have been repeatedly knocking on the doors of this Court and have been frustrated by the respondents by giving undertakings, which they had no intention and means to comply with. Such undertakings were given merely to buy time…”, the bench further noted in the judgment.
Appearances:
Petitioners: Senior Advocate Mohit Mathur, Advocates J.S Bedi, Kuljeet Singh, Amanpreet Singh Bhalla, Ankit Singh Sinsinwar, Advocates Nikhilesh Kumar, Chetan Anand, Akash Srivastava & Tejaswini Singh, Sumeet Kaur, Atul Kumar, Abhimanyu Sharma, Mangesh Naik, Ajay Kapur, Charanpreet Singh, Sonali Arora, Kartik Malhotra, Darsh Bansal, Parminder Singh Goindi
Respondents: Senior Advocates I.S.Alag, Kirti Uppal, with Advocates Avneet Kaur, Abhinash K. Mishra Gaurav Kr. Pandey, alongwith President and General Secretary of the DSGMC. Naushad Ahmed Khan and Pragya Dubey, Advocates for DOE Avnish Ahlawat, Standing Counsel for GNCTD (Service) with Tania Ahlawat, Nitesh Kumar Singh, Laavanya Kaushil, Aliza Alam, Mohnish Sehrawat, Latika Chaudhary, Advocates for DOE ASC Yeeshu Jain, Jyoti Tyagi and Hitanshu Mishra, Sujeet Kumar Mishra & Utkarsh & Pankaj Balwan, Gaurav Dhingra, V.Balaji & Nizamuddin, ASC Anupam Srivastava GNCTD.
Cause Title: Tejinder Pal Gujral v. S Manjinder Singh Sirsa & Ors.