'Recruitment of teachers soon after pending legal cases are resolved'

MP. 7 May 2017, Kolkata: State Education minister Partha Chatterjee on Sunday said that the government would start the recruitment process of teachers soon after legal cases are solved. He indicated that the government would publish the results of the examination conducted for the recruitment of teachers in upper primary level.

"We will soon publish Upper Primary results. The result of Higher Secondary level has already come out," Chatterjee said, who was addressing a convention organised by teachers in the city on Sunday.

It may be mentioned that the result of the written examination of School Service Commission (SSC) was published on Tuesday. SSC had conducted the examination on December 4, last year. But the publication of the result was stalled due to some legal issues. Though the state government managed to publish the result, the process of recruitment could not be started due to cases pending in the Calcutta high court.

The West Bengal School Service Commission conducts the recruitment of upper primary for government-aided and government-sponsored schools. According to a source, there are around 5,000 vacancies for recruitment of assistant teachers in the state government run-schools in Higher Secondary level. But the total number of vacancies adding Secondary, Higher Secondary and Upper Primary would be much higher in number.

"We will recruit around 70,000 teachers. Some results have already been published," Chatterjee said.

However, in his speech, Chatterjee also discussed some other issues.

He said that the successful candidates would have to face police verifications in primary teachers' recruitment. The minister did not clarify the process of police verification, saying that it would be decided later. He also mentioned that a medical test would be taken for newly recruited teachers before their joining.

The Education minister said that the government will bring a new transfer policy for the teachers. 

"In that new policy, the teachers will able to take transfers in their own districts. The women will get preference in the transfer policy," the minister said adding: "The teachers will not be given the liberty to take frequent transfers."

It may be recalled that the Calcutta high court had directed the state government to publish the results of the examination of primary teachers' recruitment last year. The government had just completed the process of recruitment a couple of month ago. But the government held the other recruitments due to pending cases in court.