West Bengal teachers recruitment scam: Mamata on backfoot over SC ruling, BJP says 'Didi will go to jail'

Mamata Banerjee

The Supreme Court's annulment of over 25,000 teacher recruitment by the West Bengal government has become the latest flashpoint between the ruling Trinamool Congress and the BJP.

What did the top court say?

A bench comprising Chief Justice of India (CJI) Sanjiv Khanna and Justice Sanjay Kumar upheld a Calcutta High Court verdict of April 22, 2024, annulling the appointments and said the tainted candidates should refund their “salaries/payments received”.

"This is a case wherein the entire selection process has been vitiated and tainted beyond resolution. Manipulations and frauds on a large scale, coupled with the attempted cover-up, have dented the selection process beyond repair and partial redemption…,” said the 41-page judgement authored by the CJI.

The top court said the appointments of these candidates are cancelled. “However, candidates who are already employed need not be asked to refund or restitute any payments made to them. However, their services will be terminated. Furthermore, no candidate can be appointed once the entire examination process and results have been declared void,” it held.

The top court gave relief to such employees who were not in the category of tainted candidates and had previously worked in other state departments or with autonomous bodies.

Addressing the issue of disabled candidates, the bench noted the high court held one Soma Das to continue on humanitarian grounds. Disabled candidates would be allowed to participate in the fresh selection process, if required, with age relaxation and other concessions.

Row explained

The state had created supernumerary in state-run and state-aided schools. More than 23 lakh candidates had appeared for the state-level selection test in 2016. The number of vacant posts was 24,640, but 25,753 appointment letters were issued. It was alleged that these supernumeric posts provided room for illegal recruitment.

Irregularities in the teachers' recruitment had spelled trouble for the Mamata Banerjee-led state government. Several of top Trinamool leaders, including former education minister Partha Chatterjee, are in jail in connection with the case.

What is the West Bengal govt saying?

The Chief Minister said the CPI(M) and BJP must be blamed for this scam. “We have the highest regard for the judiciary, but… I cannot accept this judgment. One Chief Justice of India (CJI) stayed (the High Court verdict) and another Chief Justice cancelled it. Now you can understand what I want to say.”

She also said that her government would give support to those who lost their jobs. On April 7, the CM said she will hold a meeting for teachers who lost their jobs.

The Chief Minister questioned the “blanket dismissal” of all candidates. “The ones whom you call tainted, we don’t have proof regarding them. Does the BJP government want to collapse the education system of Bengal? What happened in Vyapam? More than fifty people were killed,” she said, drawing a comparison to the recruitment scam in Madhya Pradesh.

‘Didi will go to jail’

BJP leader Sambit Patra said that rule of law would prevail and assured that if the BJP were to come to power in the state, Mamata Banerjee would be held accountable.

"Didi jail jayengi, albat jayengi. Hindustan mein kanoon ka shasan hai. (Didi will go to jail, definitely she will. There is a rule of law in India.) The day BJP forms a government in Bengal, the full force of the law will be brought upon Mamata Banerjee," news agency ANI quoted Sambit Patra as saying.

Patra also accused the Banerjee government of “institutionalising corruption” and stifling investigations into the school recruitment scam.

"A few days ago, Mamata Banerjee went to Oxford and called herself a tigress. But no tigress engages in corruption. The way her government has allowed corruption to flourish in Bengal, lakhs of people have suffered," he said.

A protest march by ABVP, the students’ wing of the BJP, from Karunamoyee in Salt Lake to Bikash Bhawan — the headquarters of the West Bengal School Service Commission (SSC) — was on Thursday stopped by police, triggering a confrontation between the two sides.