Will challenge HC order on Bengal teacher jobs in SC: School Service Commission chief

The court has nullified about 24,000 jobs and we will approach the Supreme Court after going through the complete high court order,

PTI, Kolkata, Apr 22, 2024 : West Bengal School Service Commission (SSC) Chairman Siddharth Majumder on Monday said it will challenge in the Supreme Court the Calcutta High Court's order cancelling all appointments made through a 2016 recruitment test in schools.

Candidates were appointed by the SSC in the categories of teachers of classes 9, 10, 11 and 12 and group C and D staffers through the State Level Selection Test-2016.

"The court has nullified about 24,000 jobs and we will approach the Supreme Court after going through the complete high court order,” Majumder told reporters here.

The Calcutta High Court on Monday ordered cancellation of all appointments made through the recruitment process of the SLST-2016 in West Bengal government-sponsored and aided schools.

The bench also directed the SSC to initiate a fresh recruitment process.

"We will go through the order... discuss and understand the legal aspects,” Majumder said in response to queries on what steps the commission would take in the wake of the verdict.

West Bengal Board of Secondary Education President Ramanuj Ganguly said the state government has already said it will move the Supreme Court against the judgment and he has nothing more to add.

He told PTI: "However, I have a question for the honourable judiciary. Did all the candidates get the chance to be cross-examined individually by central agencies?”

Ganguly said there may have been some recruits against whose eligibility no doubts were raised.

The board president added he had full faith in the judiciary and the justice delivery system 

Agencies: The SSC, responsible for the recruitments, said anomalies had been found in the case of about 5,000 appointees, and not all the 25,000. 

“We told the court that there were complaints of anomalies about the recruitment of 5,000 teaching and non-teaching staff. This we ascertained from what the CBI told us,” current SSC chairman Siddhartha Majumdar told a news conference. 

“We cannot understand how the court thought it would be proper to cancel the appointments of another 19,000 candidates.” 

In March, the commission had told the division bench that it had begun the process of cancelling the appointments that allegedly involved anomalies. It said it had cancelled the advisory panel recommendations based on which 808 secondary teachers, 842 Group C employees and 1,911 Group D employees had been appointed to government-aided schools following allegations that their marks had been manipulated or they had jumped ranks. 

The commission had also told the court that it had identified about 770 higher secondary teachers whose appointments appeared illegal.