“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.”

Justice Navin Chawla also issued show cause notices to the previous management committees of the DSGMC, directing them to submit their responses within a period of four weeks.

He further ordered that any rent received by the DSGMC and the Guru Harkrishan Public School (New Delhi) Society, which is operated by the DSGMC and is responsible for managing various schools, shall be attached and utilized solely for the purpose of settling the arrears owed to the 12 schools managed by the Guru Harkrishan Public School Society (GHPS Society) in accordance with the sixth and seventh CPC.

The Court directed that the salary and other financial benefits of the members of the GHPS Society and the DSGMC shall also be withheld until further orders or until the entire dues of the employees, including teaching and non-teaching staff of the schools, are fully settled.

The Court issued this order in response to a series of petitions filed by the staff of the 12 schools managed by the GHPS Society, alleging non-compliance with the High Court's directive issued on November 16, 2021. In that directive, the GHPS and DSGMC were instructed to settle the salaries and arrears of the staff in accordance with the recommendations of the pay commissions. This order was challenged in an appeal. During the hearing of the matter, various assurances were given to the Court that the salaries would be disbursed and the outstanding dues would be cleared.

Justice Chawla thoroughly examined the case and determined that the assurances and commitments made were merely attempts to delay the proceedings, and now efforts were being made to shift the blame onto the previous managements.

The Court reached the conclusion that Harmeet Singh Kalka, Jagdeep Singh Khalon, and Mandeep Kaur, the honorary secretary of GHPS Society, are not fit to continue holding their positions. However, before any removal orders are issued, the Court mandated a forensic audit of the GHPS Society and the 12 schools under its management for the period from April 2020 to December 2023. Consequently, the Court ordered the audit of the society and directed the auditor to submit the initial audit report by July 31, 2024.

Additionally, the Court directed the DSGMC to allocate funds to the GHPS Society to ensure that going forward, employees are paid in accordance with the CPC recommendations, and their outstanding arrears are also settled.

The Court dismissed the argument suggesting that the DSGMC is not accountable for settling the outstanding dues of the school staff.

Senior Advocate Mohit Mathur, along with advocates JS Bedi, Kuljeet Singh, Amanpreet Singh Bhalla, Ankit Singh Sinsinwar, 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, and Parminder Singh Goindi, represented the teaching staff in the case.