Calcutta HC orders dismissal of 53 primary teachers from service

Kolkata: The Calcutta High Court on Friday ordered the dismissal of 53 primary teachers from service in West Bengal government-sponsored and aided schools for irregularities in their recruitment.

They are among the 269 persons whose services had been terminated by the court in an earlier order.

The Supreme Court had directed that these 269 persons be given an opportunity to be heard by the high court.

As per this order, 54 primary teachers moved the court of Justice Abhijit Gangopadhyay, who had ordered the termination of their service, and submitted affidavits.

After perusal of their submissions, Justice Gangopadhyay on Friday ordered the dismissal of 53 of these primary teachers.

Noting severe irregularities in appointments of teachers by the West Bengal Board of Primary Education on petitions by candidates who claimed to have been denied jobs despite having qualified Teachers' Eligibility Test (TET) in 2014, Justice Gangopadhyay had ordered a CBI investigation in the matter.

He had also ordered the termination of jobs of 269 primary teachers who were found to have got the jobs through manipulation of marks and ranks in the results of the TET.

The petitioners before the single bench had alleged that although they appeared for TET-2014, no list containing the marks of candidates and indicating their respective merit positions was ever published and that an additional panel of 273 candidates was prepared illegally, who were granted one additional mark out of over 20 lakh candidates who appeared for the TET.

It was claimed that by dint of this one additional mark, 269 candidates got qualified for the job of teachers and subsequently got appointments.

Former primary school board chairman Manik Bhattacharya, who is also a ruling Trinamool Congress MLA from Palashipara in Nadia, was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate (ED), which is also probing the money trail in the matter.