Kolkata: An advocate practising with Calcutta High Court, on Tuesday, issued contempt-of-court notices to four officials of the state education department on the notification issued by the West Bengal School Service Commission (WBSSC) last month to fill posts of teachers in state-run schools becoming vacant following the Supreme Court order cancelling 25,753 school jobs.
The contempt-of-court notices were issued to the state school education department secretary, the departmental commissioner, the West Bengal School Service Commission (WBSSC) chairman, and the West Bengal Board of Secondary Education (WBBSE) president.
In the contempt-of-court notice to the four officials of the state education department, it has been mentioned that besides violating the apex court’s directions on fresh recruitment, the state education department also violated the Supreme Court’s directives to start the process of recovery of salaries paid to those teaching and non-teaching staff who have been identified as “tainted” so far of getting jobs through unfair means after paying money.
The notice follows a public interest litigation (PIL) filed earlier in the day by another petitioner at a single-judge vacation bench of the Calcutta High Court challenging the notification.
The main ground on which the notification was challenged was that the weightage criteria in the distribution of total marks had changed from those in 2016, the entire panel of which was cancelled first by the division bench of the Calcutta High Court last year and then by a division bench of the Supreme Court in April.
These modifications in weightage criteria, according to the petitioner, violated the Supreme Court’s directives on fresh recruitments.
On April 3 this year, the Supreme Court’s division bench of erstwhile Chief Justice of India Sanjiv Khanna upheld a previous order of the Calcutta High Court’s division bench cancelling 25,753 school jobs in West Bengal.
The Apex Court also accepted the observation of the Calcutta High Court that the entire panel of 25,753 candidates had to be cancelled because of the failure of the state government and the commission to segregate the “untainted” candidates from the “tainted” ones.
The state government and West Bengal School Service Commission (WBSSC) had already filed review petitions at the Apex Court on this issue.
(IANS)
