PhD or not - the interview call would not come anytime soon for the 1.5 lakh candidates applying for a teacher's job at state universities or colleges.

Sources said the delay in appointment of teachers at the university is primarily because of legal tangles. In its directive last December, Patna High Court asked the executing agency - Bihar Public Service Commission (BPSC) - to include all candidates having PhD as per 2009 norms as well as those having PhD before 2009 as applicants.

However, the BPSC is yet to start the appointment process.

In spite of the high court directive, the state government failed to issue any fresh notifications for appointment of teachers in university who have PhD degree prior to the 2009 norms, but many candidates based on the high court directive and having PhD norms too have applied for the teacher's job.

The high court directive gave respite to thousands of aspirants, who have spent several years of their career in pursuing research and getting PhD degrees from different universities of the state prior to the enforcement of UGC regulations in 2009 but were not eligible to appear for teachers post as per the BPSC advertisement in September 2014.

In the advertisement, the BPSC made it clear that only those candidates who are NET-qualified or those who have got their PhD degrees as per the provisions of the UGC regulations of 2009 would be called for interview.

Sources said even though the BPSC starts the appointment process within a week, it would be a Herculean task for it to carry out interview process of around 1.5 lakh candidates who have applied for the teachers' job.

A senior teacher at Magadh University on condition of anonymity said: 'With around 1 lakh applications, if the BPSC plans to conduct interview of more than 1,000 applicants in a day than too it would take 100 days which is a huge task for the BPSC.'

On the other hand, the education department has lobbed the ball to the BPSC court. S.M. Karim, higher education director, said: 'Now it is the task of the BPSC to carry out the interview process and the role of education department is limited.'

The appointment of assistant professors in the universities of Bihar is being carried out after a gap of 12 years as last appointment of teachers was done in 2003.

Even teachers at universities are worried over delay in appointment process. Randhir Kumar Singh, a teacher at Patna University said: 'The delay in appointment of teachers is going to create academic problem at universities.'