In a notable judgment, the Delhi High Court has quashed the decision of a private college to refuse renewal of service contract of an ad-hoc Professor who had opted to take maternity leave

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  In a notable judgment, the Delhi High Court has quashed the decision of a private college to refuse renewal of service contract of an ad-hoc Professor who had opted to take maternity leave

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1. In the case Manisha Priyadarsini vs Aurobindo College-Evening and others, the Court observed that maternity leave cannot be a legitimate ground for denying extension of tenure to the petitioner. The Court added that such denial would amount to penalizing a woman for electing to become a mother.
2. This is violative of the basic principle of equality in the eyes of law.
3. It would also tantamount to depriving her of the protection assured under Article 21 of the Constitution of India of her right to employment and protection of her reproductive rights as a woman.
4. Such a consequence is therefore absolutely unacceptable and goes against the very grain of the equality principles enshrined in Articles 14 and 16.
5. While directing the College to reinstate the Appellant Professor within one week, the Division Bench of Justice Hima Kohli and Justice Asha Menon imposed a cost of Rs. 50,000 on the Respondents for giving arbitrary and unmerited reasons for not renewing the term of the Appellant.
6. Case History - The Appellant was a contractual Assistant Professor at the Respondent College, and her term was coming to an end in March 2019. It has been a practice to renew the term of contractual teachers for 120 days after giving them a nominal break of one day between the two terms. On Feb 22, 2019, she had requested the Respondent College for grant of maternity leave alongwith all other eligible benefits under the Maternity Benefit Act, 1961 but after reiterating the request for maternity leave several times, she received a communication stating that the college had not "forced" her to join duty and that she should also inform the college of the date when she "intended" to join, thus, indicating that she was still on their rolls but later she received a communication from the College stating that the Delhi University doesn't extend maternity benefits to contractual teachers, thus, rejecting her request for maternity leave. On May 24, 2019 she reported to College to continue with her duties but five days later it was informed to her that her tenure had ended on March 18, 2019, she was no longer on the rolls of the college and therefore, there was no question of her joining back on duty or being assigned any work.

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