Kolkata: The Calcutta high court today, April 22, cancelled the jobs of 24,000 employees who got their jobs in government-aided schools of Bengal through the 2016 West Bengal School Service Commission-led recruitment drive.
In a judgment that is certain to see statewide ripples, a bench of Justices Debangsu Basak and Mohammad Shabbar Rashidi held that their recruitment had been invalid and asked all of them to “return their salaries” within four weeks.
The Bengal SSC exam scam has rocked state politics, leading to years of protests by teachers against the ruling Mamata Banerjee government. Wrong evaluation of answer sheets, favouritism, bribery and widespread corruption allegations had surrounded the landmark case. The Central Bureau of Investigation is investigating the case at present. Several top Trinamool Congress leaders, ministers and legislators are in jail in connection with their alleged involvement in the case.
Bar and Bench has reported that the high court bench has ordered a fresh recruitment process and said that there was no clarity as to which of the 23 lakh sheets were evaluated properly.
The investigations into alleged irregularities in recruitments started after three separate petitions were filed in the Calcutta high court in August-September 2022, as The Wire had reported. More cases were unearthed during the course of the hearing as the judge – now Bharatiya Janata Party Lok Sabha poll candidate Abhijit Gangopadhyay – had insisted on various documents as more petitioners joined in with more examples.
