The Supreme Court has held that a Writ Petition by a private teacher will be maintainable against the private unaided school over the enforcement of the statutory pay scales.

“Imparting education by an institution, recognized under a statute, is akin to performing a public duty. Therefore, teaching activity has a direct nexus in performance of that public duty and if rights of the teaching staff flow from a statute, a writ petition would lie for enforcement of those rights.”, observed a bench of Justice Manoj Misra and Justice Vijay Bishnoi.

The bench upheld the Bombay High Court's Aurangabad Bench order, which allowed the Respondents-teachers ' writ petition filed under Article 226 for enforcement of a statutory pay scale by the Appellants-private unaided schools.

The Court agreed with the High Court's findings, which held that “when the State by a statute regulates the service conditions qua recruitment, etc. and mandates institutions to pay salaries to teachers at a certain scales of pay, there is a public element to it, thereby imposing a public duty on those institutions to pay salary, etc. to teachers at rates not less than those specified; therefore, for enforcement of those public and statutory obligations, writ petition would be maintainable.”

The dispute arose after teachers employed in private unaided schools approached the Bombay High Court seeking implementation of the statutory pay scales.

The High Court directed the institutions to fix the teachers' salaries in accordance with Schedule 'C' of the Maharashtra Employees of Private Schools (Conditions of Service) Regulation Rules, 1981, pay regular salaries from April 2017 and clear arrears within six months. It also restrained the institutions from recovering amounts already paid in excess.

The private institutions challenged the maintainability of the writ petitions before the Supreme Court.

Dismissing the private institutions' appeal, the Court observed that the Respondent-teachers ' writ petition would not have been maintainable if they sought adjudication of a private contractual dispute with the institutes [See Army Welfare Education Society New Delhi v. Sunil Kumar Sharma & Ors. Etc. 2024 LiveLaw (SC) 464]. Since their entitlement to receive regular pay flows from the statutory rules, there's no bar against the maintainability of the Writ petition for enforcement of the statutory obligations, the Court said.

“…where the rights of which enforcement is sought flow from a statute and the provisions of the statute cast a duty on an educational institution, a writ petition would lie even against a private unaided educational institution so long performance of that duty has a public element to it. Reason is simple, Article 226 of the Constitution empowers the High Courts to issue writs to any person or authority and, therefore, those writs are not confined to State, or its instrumentalities, or an 'authority', falling within the four corners of Article 12 of the Constitution. Imparting education by an institution, recognized under a statute, is akin to performing a public duty. Therefore, teaching activity has a direct nexus in performance of that public duty and if rights of the teaching staff flow from a statute, a writ petition would lie for enforcement of those rights. Thus, the form of the body concerned is not very much relevant. What is relevant is the nature of the duty imposed on the body. However, even though the writ petition can be maintained against any person discharging public duties and/ or public functions, the same should not be entertained if the enforcement of duty sought falls in the realm of private law. Because the scope of mandamus is basically limited to enforcement of public duty.”, the Court observed.

As a result, the appeal was dismissed.

Cause Title: SIYARAM EDUCATION SOCIETY VERSUS CHHAYA D/O BALIRAM DHAVE & ORS. (with connected matters)

Citation : 2026 LiveLaw (SC) 819

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Appearance:

For Appellant(s) : Mr. Sudhanshu S. Choudhari, Sr. Adv. Mr. Ghatole Shakul Rajesh, AOR Ms. Aparna Kulkarni, Adv. Mr. Sachin Patil, Adv. Mr. Satyajeet Kharde, Adv. Mr. Sunny Jadhav, Adv. Mr. Arun Longani, Adv. Mr. Sunil Kumar Verma, AOR

For Respondent(s) : M/S. Lawyer S Knit & Co, AOR Ms. Bina Madhavan, Adv. Mr. S. Udaya Kumar Sagar, Adv. Mr. S. Tridev Sagar, Adv. Ms. Sanya Jain, Adv. Mr. Ravinder Singh, Adv. Mr. Rahul Joshi, AOR Mr. Aniruddha Deshmukh, Adv. Mr. Siddharth Dharmadhikari, Adv. Mr. Aaditya Aniruddha Pande, AOR Mr. Shrirang B. Varma, Adv.