There appears to be a paradox, on the teaching front, existing in schools in Delhi, India. While on the one hand, there is a dearth of jobs for teachers, yet, on the other, the Delhi Government finds itself unable to fill all the vacancies in Government schools because of 'reservation'.

According to Government of India rules, the reservation provision is 27 per cent for Other Backward Classes, 15 percent for Scheduled Castes, and 7.5 per cent for Scheduled Tribes.

According to the Delhi Education Minister, Dr. Narender Nath there seems no problem in filling the vacancies for SCs and OBCs, it is the ST vacancies that cannot be filled because there are very few Scheduled Tribes here- and hence hardly any applications." As a result, more than 250 such vacancies remain vacant.

So, while the line of 'unemployed teachers' continues to grow outside the employment exchanges, there are posts that remain empty, waiting for the 'right' (?) candidates.  In order to ensure that students do not suffer because of an absence of teachers, it has been suggested that the Government of India de-reserve, where necessary, teaching posts for ST candidates.

To further increase the number of teachers in schools, the Delhi Government has fixed the date for the meeting of the Departmental Promotion Committee, which will promote 800 teachers from schools run by the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) to work in schools run by the Delhi Government.