Nearly 12 years after a single judge showed the door to over 2,800 JBT teachers, the Punjab and Haryana High Court has drawn the curtain on the recruitment dispute. The Haryana Government will retain the currently serving teachers. It will also offer prospective appointments to 160 writ petitioners based strictly on academic merit.In all, 3,206 JBT teachers were appointed by the Om Parkash Chautala-led government. Thirteen years later, Justice K Kannan had then ruled that the published selection list was not genuine and did not contain the names of “all candidates who were meritorious”.The Bench had asserted that the selection was vitiated “though not fully”, and also rejected the argument that the selection of candidates after 13 years could not be interfered with.Acting on appeals filed against the Single Bench judgment, the Division Bench of Justice Harsimran Singh Sethi and Justice Amarinder Singh Grewal made it clear that the outcome flowed entirely from the state government’s stand accepted by all parties and not from any adjudication by the court on the merits of the controversy. The Bench was assisted in the matter by senior advocates Puneet Bali and Gurminder Singh, among others.The Bench observed: “The present order has been passed solely in view of the stand taken by the respondent state. Nothing contained in this order shall be construed as an expression of opinion on the merits of the issues raised in the present appeals by this court.”The court noted that “there is no adjudication of the issue by this Bench in the appeal”. It then modified the single judge’s January 8, 2014, judgment to align with the Haryana Government’s July 28 communication.Recording the state’s submissions, the Bench noted that the “competent authority” had reconsidered the matter in view of the “extraordinary facts of the present cases”, where the selected candidates had continued in service for “more than two-three decades and some of them have already retired”.The state informed the court that the Director, Elementary Education, Haryana, had decided “not to disturb the candidates who have already been appointed and are continuing for the past two-three decades on their respective posts, especially as some of them have already retired”.The government also examined the claims of the 221 writ petitioners covered by the 2014 judgment solely on the basis of academic merit, excluding interview marks. “It has been found that approximately 160 petitioners fall within the zone of selection on the basis of academic qualifications,” it was added.The government, as such, decided to offer them fresh appointments, subject to certain conditions, including: “The appointments shall be made prospectively against available vacancies; no retrospective appointment, seniority, continuity of service, back wages, arrears of pay or any other consequential monetary or service benefits shall be admissible.”The communication added that the decision was “purely as a one-time equitable measure to resolve this long-pending litigation and shall not be treated or cited as a precedent in any other case”.Explaining the rationale, the communication said the proposal sought “to balance the competing equities by protecting the services of employees who have served the state for over two decades while extending equitable relief to those petitioners who, on the basis of academic merit, fall within the selection zone, thereby bringing finality to a litigation pending for more than two decades”.