NI Act Holiday: Can Schools Ignore It?

Requirement of putting signature in Attendance Register is itself indicative of treatment of the very date as a bonafide working day (i.e. not a holiday) when the employees are on duty in the office/ workplace. Therefore, the teaching and non-teaching employees are required to put signatures in the Attendance Register ONLY WHEN the 26th Jan., the 15th Aug. & the 2nd Oct., which are otherwise declared as the National Holidays under N.I. Act, are not included in the list of approved holidays (65 nos.) in the schools, that is to say these days are considered as normal working days in those schools. These schools exchange these three days with three other days which are declared as holidays in the approved holiday list of the schools to maintain the constancy of 65 holidays. Whenever these three National Holidays are considered as holidays in the approved list of a school the teachers and non-teaching staffs do not put signatures in the Attendance Register. Because of reduction of number of holidays from 80 to 65 such type of tedious exercises (permutations & combinations) have become necessary, causing hardship mainly to the HMs and, making the entire system confusing/ apparently contradictory.

Dear Mr. Bhunia,
I know a school in Hooghly District, which sometimes keeps these three National Holidays outside the approved list of 65 holidays. The school remains open and teachers and non-teaching staffs put their signatures in the Attendance Registrar in these days as they do in normal working days. But no regular classes are held. In lieu of these three working days, the school grants three holidays either to adjust with normal summer vacation/ Puja vacation or on account of “Chhat Puja“, or in conjunction with the 25th Dec. in the end of year, thereby maintaing 65 days approved holidays.
Again I know many schools which observe these days as National Holidays when teachers & staffs do not sign the Registers for attendance and, schools remain closed.
Holiday list is prepared by the HM in consultation with all other teachers as per convenience and, finally approved by MC. So, there is a scope to exchange any standard holiday(s), which is declared by the Govt. under N.I. Act, with some other day(s) for the benefit of all the teachers, staffs and students. I know that this is a common practice in aided schools. HM has the liberty to adjust holidays in consideration of the interest of all. But, I don’t know whether or not the HM or MC has any authority to exclude the National Holidays from the standard holiday list.
Disparity in the holiday list in schools is perhaps attributable to the system which permits the schools to prepare & finalise the lists as per their convenience & choice. As many schools so many lists and hence, so much diversities!
Let other members especially the teachers and HMs express their views.
Thank you.

“There was arisen the same question from the Headmaster, Talpur Pathsala ,P.O.- Talpur, Dt. Hooghly, on his letter no. 30/80 dated 22.04.80.
In reply dated 11.07.80 in behalf of WBBSE, the secretary, A. Gupta clarified that “Holidays declared by the Govt. of West Bengal and by the Govt. of India the N.I.Act or by any competent authority may be regarded as ‘Special Holidays’ in addition to the approved holidays in a year.”

The total number of holidays in an educational calender year is 65. The NI Act holidays are ‘Special Holidays’ outside this number ( 65 ).

The term “Holiday” is defined by the Govt. of WB in the following Notification:
“NOTIFICATION
No. 3857F., dated 15th August 1971.
In exercise of the powers conferred by the proviso to Article 309 of the Constitution of India, the Governor is pleased to make the following rules:
CHAPTER I—EXTENT OF APPLICATION
…………………………………..
CHAPTER II—DEFINITIONS
Holiday means—
(a) a holiday prescribed or notified by or under Section 25 of the Negotiable Instruments Act, 1881 as amended by Act No. XXXVII of 1955, and
(b) in relation to any particular office, a day on which such office is ordered to be closed, by notification of Government or of the High Court, as the case may be, in the “Calcutta Gazette”, for the transaction of public business without reserve or qualification.
…………………
………………..”

Insofar as the matter relates to the common holidays under N.I. Act, the aided/sponsored schools seem to have different provisions where all the scheduled Public Holidays under N.I. Act are treated as “Special Holidays”! If so, they are not probably under obligation to avail of Public Holidays including 26th January, 15th Aug. & 2nd Oct. to avoid crossing the limit of 65 holidays.
May I request the members to upload the letter dated 11.07.1980, written by A. Gupta, Ex- Secy., WBBSE in regard to N.I. Act holidays in aided schools.
What are the holidays generally included in the list of 65 days in aided schools if all the Public Holidays are excluded from the list by treating them as “Special Holidays”?

Now, the question is ‘Can a school authority ignore it ?’, i.e. Can they run the normal class-hour activities of the school on such a particular day ?
The answer is ‘Yes’; they can, if they float above the level of normal understanding. And the answer is ‘No’, if they are Indians and obey the national urge tinkling in their veins.

That’s why, I think, holiday system in aided schools is sometimes very confusing as it is subject to the discretion of HMs and MCs.

The list of holidays declared by the Govt. of WB under N.I. Act for year 2012 is available from the following thread:
https://wbxpress.com/list-of-holidays-2012/
Now, a comparative study of the said Govt. holiday list with the model holiday list prescribed by WBBSE in its Memo No. N/S/30 dated 31.01.2012 for aided/sponsored schools for Academic Year 2012 clearly brings out the truth that all the holidays declared by the Govt. under N.I. Act before commencement of year 2012 have been included in the 65 holidays for the schools. If so, how is it true that N.I. Act holidays are always SPECIAL or EXTRA and remain outside the approved list!
Friends,
While addressing the issue “NI act Holiday: Can schools ignore it?” I can say that the aided/ sponsored schools being non-govt. organisations are NOT under any obligation to remain closed on any of the holidays declared by the State Govt. under NI Act – be it declared before commencement of the year or in the currency of the year. In other words, such schools have every right to prepare & approve their OWN holiday list as per the Model List of the Board. State Govt. does NOT forward copy of its holiday list to the schools as it is not meant for them. However, if the copy of the Notification/ G.O. is forwarded to the Director of School Education or D.I.(SE) /(P) for compliance with the Govt. decision in schools then the schools shall compulsorily declare these days as holidays. This is the official procedure of following an instruction or order.
It is quite obvious that when the teachers are required to be present in the schools for attending/ organising cultural programmes unlike Govt. employees how can they enjoy that day in home or elsewhere without official works! So, schools may exchange these days with some other holidays, especially in continuation of Summer/Puja/Winter (Christmas) vacations or with any local festival etc.

You will see that in the column no.6 in the list of holidays,there is a special remarks with (*) sign,there is no compulsory or mandatory to sign in the attendance register for such observatory days like 26th January,15th August etc. although these regard as holidays within 65 days. Now, a question must usually arises from the teachers, they usually say that according to the circular, the presence of teachers are not mandatory. So, the teachers are not interested to attain schools on that observatory days.
Only H.M. may tackle and solve the problems in his own way.

@mbhunia
As pointed out by Mr. Mihir Kumar Acharya with reference to the N.B. No. 6 in the WBBSE Memo No. N/S/30 dated 31.01.2012, it is NOT MANDATORY for the teachers and staffs to put signatures in the Attendance Register on the National Holidays. He is very correct that many teachers do not voluntarily want to attend the cultural programmes in the schools on those days. In order to tackle the situation HMs & MCs make the attendance compulsory by NOT declaring those days as holidays. The days are adjusted elsewhere in the year.

I fully agree with Mr. Acharya and Mr. Chakraborty over this conflict.