Shawls and sweets were ready for the Delhi High Court judges for regularising Kashmiri migrant teachers in state-run schools in the city but they politely refused saying they cannot accept them in lieu of performing their duty.
The verdict regularising all the Kashmiri migrant teachers, who had to leave their native state after the 1986 violence, brought smiles on the faces of the teachers present in the court and as a token of gratitude, they brought two shawls for the two judges and came forward to present it to them.
However, both the judges, Justices S Ravindra Bhat and Deepa Sharma, refused to take it saying they value the expressions of the teachers but they just performed their duty.
"We really value you expression of gratitude but we have just done out job that was required to be done. We cannot accept it," Justice Sharma said.
The teachers had also brought sweets and distributed it among themselves, lawyers and court staff after the bench rose.
Anxiously waiting for the bench to assemble post lunch, the Kashmiri teachers stood at a corner of the court room.
The moment the bench pronounced the verdict, directing the Delhi government and the three MCDs and NDMC to regularise the Kashmiri teachers from the date of their first appointment, it brought smiles on the faces of the teachers.
Unable to control their emotions, several of them broke down and hugged each other in the court room and thanked the judges.
The incident dates back to 1986 when the law and order situation in the Kashmir Valley had deteriorated and large-scale communal violence was prevalent.
Fearing risk to their lives, there was a mass exodus of Kashmiris, who migrated to Jammu, Delhi and other places nearby. These people who had left their homes, jobs and properties had to be settled in camps by the Delhi government.
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