Calcutta HC Division Bench Reserved Judgment On The Cancellation Of Appointments For More Than 36,000 Teachers

The Calcutta High Court's division bench has reserved its judgment on an appeal challenging the cancellation of appointments for more than 36,000 teachers. The bench, comprising Justices Subrata Talukdar and Supratim Bhattacharya, announced that the verdict would be delivered on May 19. The West Bengal Board of Primary Education (WBBPE) filed the appeal against the order issued by Justice Abhijit Gangopadhyay. During the hearing on Tuesday, the division bench inquired whether the original petitioners could claim that all 36,000 individuals, whose employment has been affected, had engaged in fraudulent practices to secure their jobs.

On May 12, Justice Gangopadhyay issued an order to cancel the appointments of 36,000 teachers in response to a recruitment scandal known as the "school jobs for cash scam." The judge, presiding over cases related to illegal recruitment in schools in West Bengal, learned that during the 2016 recruitment process, numerous "untrained" candidates with lower scores in the Teachers Eligibility Test (TET) and other assessments were appointed.

The Court discovered that these candidates were granted additional marks or awarded maximum marks in aptitude tests, which were only conducted on paper. It was noted that no selection committee was formed to assess the eligibility of candidates and instead, an external third party, unrelated to the Education Board, handled the selection process. This flagrantly violated the Recruitment Rules, as stated by the single judge.

Consequently, the judge invalidated the appointments of all 36,000 candidates who were untrained at the time of their recruitment in 2016.

During the proceedings before the division bench, advocate Tarunjyoti Tiwari, representing the original writ petitioners, emphasized that despite their clients scoring higher marks than the appointed 36,000 individuals, they were not offered the job. Another advocate, representing certain teachers, drew attention to Justice Gangopadhyay's previous dismissal of similar petitions on April 3, citing a six-year delay in filing them. Another point raised by an advocate was that the single judge had made the decision without any supporting evidence.

Furthermore, the council highlighted that similar petitions had been rejected by Justice Hiranmay Bhattacharyya, a different single-judge, in the previous year.