On May 29th, the Patna High Court instructed the Bihar government to ensure parity between “contract teachers” and “guest teachers” in the recruitment process overseen by the Bihar Public Service Commission (BPSC). Consequently, the court issued a stay on BPSC’s Teachers Recruitment Exam (TRE)-3, specifically on Advertisement No. 22/24 dated February 2024. The judgement comes after the BPSC’s TRE 3.0 advertisement did not provide the same preferential marks to guest teachers. The BPSC is expected to announce a new exam date after the elections.
Justice Anjani Kumar Sharan, while disposing of petitions, stated that both contract teachers and guest teachers perform the same teaching duties without differentiation. He directed the state government to decide within a month to grant five marks for each year of employment, up to a maximum of 25 marks, to guest teachers, similar to contract teachers.
The high court’s ruling will favour more than 4,000 guest teachers statewide in Bihar, enabling their participation in the BPSC teachers’ recruitment exam with equivalent preferential marks as contract teachers. These guest teachers were removed from their roles on April 1, 2024, as per an education department directive.
