A DIVISION bench of the Calcutta High Court Monday cancelled the appointment of 25,753 teachers and non-teaching staff made through the State Level Selection Test (SLST) 2016 in schools sponsored and aided by the West Bengal government. The court also ordered them to return their salaries with interest, and asked the state’s School Service Commission (SSC) to initiate a fresh appointment process. More than 23 lakh candidates had appeared for the SLST 2016 for 24,640 vacant posts. The bench, formed by the Chief Justice of the High Court on directions of the Supreme Court, heard 350 petitions and appeals relating to the selection of teachers of classes 9, 10, 11 and 12 and group C and D staffers through SLST 2016. The CBI had earlier arrested former state education minister Partha Chatterjee over alleged irregularities in recruitment. At a rally in Raiganj, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee called the court order “illegal” and said, “Our government will stand for those who lost their jobs and we will appeal before a higher court.” The Bench, led by Justice Debangsu Basak, observed that the OMR sheets were manipulated, making the recruitments illegal. “We have no other way but to cancel the whole recruitment panel,” Justice Basak said. The Bench, also comprising Justice Md Shabbar Rashidi, said, “All appointments granted in the selection processes involved, being violative of Articles 14 and 16 of the Constitution of India, are declared null and void and cancelled.” “We would rather have persons of integrity appointed as teachers through an untainted selection process rather than expose students to elements securing appointments through an unscrupulous selection process,” the Bench observed. “Persons who had been appointed outside the panel after expiry of the panel, as also those who submitted blank OMR sheets but obtained appointments, must return all remunerations and benefits received by them to the state exchequer along with interest calculated at 12 per cent per annum within a period of four weeks,” the Bench said. “The CBI will interrogate all persons who received appointments. CBI will undertake further investigations with regard to the persons involved in the state government approving creation of supernumerary posts to accommodate illegal appointments,” the court said. Highlighting the illegalities in the recruitment process, the court stated, “SSC had appointed an agency namely M/s NYSA for the purpose of scanning and evaluating the OMR sheets by a closed-door tender process, in violation of Articles 14 and 16 of the Constitution. Such agency had engaged another agency namely Data Scantech to scan the OMR sheets. Although scanning was done at the office premises of SSC, it is claimed by SSC that they had never engaged Data Scantech to scan the OMR sheets or authorised M/s NYSA to engage Data Scantech or any other agency.” It added, “SSC had destroyed the original OMR sheet. without the scanned mirror images being preserved in the server. Appointments higher than the declared vacancies had been given in respect of all four categories. Appointments had been given to persons who were not even in the panel and to persons who submitted blank OMR sheets. Persons placed lower in rank had been given appointment in preference to persons placed higher in rank in the merit list.” Following the order, Mamata said, “The court verdict cancelling all recruitments is illegal. We stand by those who lost jobs. We will ensure you get justice, and challenge the order in a higher court. It is not mandatory to accept all verdicts. This order was passed as per the BJP's instructions amid the elections." Siddharth Majumder, chairman of the West Bengal School Service Commission, said, “The court has nullified about 24,000 jobs and we will approach the Supreme Court after going through the complete order.”
