‘How did SSC give them admit cards?’: HC dismisses petition of 350 ‘tainted’ candidates in School Jobs Case

However, the Division Bench of Justice Tapabrata Chakraborty and Justice Reetobrata Mitra upheld the single bench’s decision, stating that the Supreme Court is already seized of the matter and that the petitioners would need to approach the apex court.

During the hearing, the court questioned the SSC counsel, Kalyan Banerjee, on how the commission issued admit cards to the tainted candidates despite the Supreme Court’s specific order barring them from participating in the exam.
“Why won’t your officers be brought to justice? Why won’t your officers be removed from their jobs? So many have lost their jobs, where the Supreme Court has stated specifically that the tainted will not be given a chance to appear in the exam, how did SSC give them admit cards?,” the court questioned the SSC counsel.

The petitioners counsel had submitted that the candidates whose names now appear on the tainted list were given admit cards for the upcoming examination.
Attributing it as a “mistake” due to the large number of applicants, Banerjee said, “It was not possible to sort out who was ‘tainted’ and who was not among lakhs of applicants. So they had to give it. That was a mistake. Within 3-4 days it was cancelled. The single bench Justice had said that tainted candidates cannot be given admit cards. Their candidature has to be cancelled. They have to barred from participating in the 2nd SLST.”

The division bench observed, “Why did SSC issue admit cards? In such a serious matter, will the commission act in such a way?
The court also noted that the officers responsible for the mistake were still in their jobs, while the petitioners had lost their employment.

The division bench stated that since the Supreme Court is already seisin of the matter, they cannot override its orders. “Can we override the SC order.? Where is the prima facie right of the petitioner to ask for consideration. This issue have to be said before the SC. You have to approach the door of the SC. We are helpless at this time. If SSC cannot justify their actions before the SC they will hold exams for you again,” it said.

Following the Supreme Court order the WBSSC on August 30 had released the names and roll numbers of 1,806 ‘tainted’ candidates on their website. After seeing their names on the ‘tainted’ list nearly 350 tainted candidates on Monday moved Calcutta High Court challenging the list.
Justice Saugata Bhattacharya, on Tuesday, while dismissing the petition, observed that since the Supreme Court is already seized of the matter, the High Court would not interfere.
In April this year, the Supreme Court ordered the termination of jobs of 25,753 teaching and non-teaching staff at the government-aided schools at the secondary and higher secondary levels, terming the 2016 SSC recruitment process “tainted”.