Bengal school recruitment scam: Exclude tainted candidates from fresh recruitment process in West Bengal, says HC
Justice Saugata Bhattacharya said that if any 'tainted or identified ineligible' candidate has already applied, the application form should be rejected.
The High Court was hearing multiple petitions challenging the 2025 recruitment guidelines issued by the WBSSC, after the Supreme Court order on April 3 scrapped the entire 2016 SLST recruitment panel and annulled 25,753 appointments of teachers for classes IX-XII as well as Group C and Group D staff.
The High Court in its order on Monday (July 7, 2025) stated that the WBSSC will have to complete the fresh selection process as per the timeline set by the Supreme Court.
Senior Advocate Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharya, referring to the April 3 judgement of the Supreme Court, said that the tainted have been completely knocked out from the recruitment process by the apex court order. Mr. Bhattacharya said that the Supreme Court has not modified its April 3 order except to allow 'untainted' candidates to continue till the end of this year. He added that the Supreme Court has allowed disabled candidates and 'candidates who are not specifically tainted' to take part in the fresh selection process. Fresh hiring for over 44,000 posts started in the State on May 30. The Supreme Court has directed that the fresh recruitment process be completed by December 31, 2025.
Tainted by corruption
'Tainted' refers to candidates who used corruption and fraudulent means to get jobs, while 'untainted' refers to teachers against whom there are no such allegations either by the WBSSC or CBI. Since the West Bengal government and WBSSC did not make a clear distinction on the number of tainted and untainted candidates, first the Calcutta High Court in 2024 and then the Supreme Court in April 2025 cancelled the entire panel.
Counsels appearing for the West Bengal government and WBSSC, however, argued that the Supreme Court has terminated jobs of tainted candidates, but it has not barred them from appearing in the examination.
Chinmoy Mondal, a leader of teachers who lost their jobs, said that even after so many developments, the State government wants to appoint 'tainted' candidates. Mr. Mondal and other candidates have approached the Court, seeking a stay on the entire recruitment process, which the Court did not entertain. 'It is clear that both the state government and the SSC are still hell-bent on standing with the tainted teachers who secured appointments by unfair means. But the court has rejected their argument,' Firdaus Shamim, an advocate for the petitioners, said.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Indian Express
11 minutes ago
- Indian Express
Tejashwi targets electoral roll revision exercise — ‘Ruining Bihar's roti-beti ties with Nepal'
Rashtriya Janata Dal leader and Bihar 's Leader of Opposition has accused the Narendra Modi government of 'ruining' the familial and kinship ties between Bihar and Nepal – a remark that comes amid speculations of Nepalese and Bangladeshi nationals being found in the state's electoral rolls. The speculations come at a time when Bihar is conducting the Special Intensive Revision – an exercise of updating its electoral rolls. The voter enumeration exercise, which requires even existing electors enrolled after 2003 to provide documentary proof to establish their date or place of birth to determine citizenship, has drawn criticism from Opposition and other critics on the ground that it could 'disenfranchise' lakhs of people. In a post on X, Yadav, a former deputy chief minister of Bihar, said the state had a 'roti-beti relationship with Nepal', referring to the state's longstanding familial and kinship ties with Nepal. He goes on to say: 'Bihar shares a 600-km open border with Nepal. Gorkhas, citizens from Nepal serve in the Indian Army and are employed in Bihar Military Police. Recruitment drives are promoted in Nepal, urging people to join our army. With its narrow-minded approach, the Modi government is even ruining relations with our neighbouring country, Nepal'. Yadav also questioned the timing and intent behind the speculations, saying: 'Ever since the Supreme Court took cognisance of the matter (SIR) and advised the Election Commission, they seem rattled. Why doesn't Mr. Gyanesh Kumar (Chief Election Commissioner) come forward and clarify everything? Since they have nothing substantial to say, they are simply pointing to fake voters?' He went on to allege: 'If there are indeed fake voters in Bihar, who's responsible? It is the Election Commission and the NDA government. For the past 20 years in Bihar and 11 years at the Centre, the BJP-NDA have been in power. If any foreign nationals have crossed our borders, obtained Indian citizenship or have their names on the voter rolls, the responsibility lies with Prime Minister Modi, Union Home Minister Amit Shah, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and their government. The security of the nation and the state falls under their jurisdiction'. The last Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the electoral roll took place in 2003 under the previous United Progressive Alliance government, he said. 'Since then, there have been several elections, including three general elections where the BJP secured big wins in Bihar. Many years have passed, and we've seen several elections — including Modi's election victories in 2014, 2019, and now 2024. So, are they saying that, when we lost by 3-4 lakh votes, it was the foreigners who voted for Modi?' he wondered.
Indian Express
12 minutes ago
- Indian Express
Faced with BJP attacks, how TMC has mobilised to defend Bengali migrant workers
At a time when the BJP is attempting to corner the Trinamool Congress (TMC) government in Bengal over the issue of undocumented immigration from Bangladesh, accusing it of turning a blind eye to the alleged problem because of electoral compulsions, the Mamata Banerjee-led party has attempted to counter by raising the issue of alleged mistreatment of Bengali migrant labourers in other states such as Odisha, Delhi, and Assam. On Wednesday, Banerjee will lead a rally in Kolkata in protest against the 'humiliation' of Bengali migrant workers. Her party believes the issue can have broad resonance, given the huge number of people from Bengal engaged in informal work outside the state. The TMC believes this strategy will once again help it impress upon the electorate that the BJP is a party of 'bohiragatos (outsiders)' that does not have the interests of Bengali migrants at heart and is more concerned about polarising the political atmosphere by stoking fears about undocumented migrants from Bangladesh. 'This high-pitched campaign not only spread the message that the BJP is anti-Bengali and cannot rule Bengal, but also sends a message to migrant workers … There are at least 50 lakh migrants from our state, and a majority of them are from the minority community. Our campaign will give them the message that only TMC is standing behind them,' said a senior TMC leader. The campaign has picked up following a series of incidents faced by Bengali migrants in other states. On July 11, Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sharma, who has been conducting deportation drives, set off a row when he said those who identified Bengali as their mother tongue in the 2011 Census could be from Bangladesh. '… In Assam, Assamese is permanent — both as the state and official language. However, if they write Bengali in the Census, it will only quantify the number of foreigners in the state,' he told reporters in Guwahati. A few days earlier, on July 7, the Odisha Police detained 444 migrant workers in Jharsuguda district on suspicion of being Bangladeshi nationals. The migrants were from districts in West Bengal such as Nadia, Murshidabad, Malda, Purba Medinipur, Birbhum, Purba Bardhaman, and South 24 Parganas. Around 50 were later released, some after furnishing additional documentation. The following day (July 8), electricity and water supply were cut off in Delhi's Bengali-dominated Jai Hind Colony. This was based on a civil court's direction in May after allegations of power theft came to light. Banerjee and the rest of the TMC leadership have taken a strong stance against each of these incidents. Targeting Sarma, the ruling party in Bengal said in an X post that he 'was spewing venom through his statements'. It added, 'Where does this hatred stem from? Why this contempt for Bengalis and Bangla? Is it because the BJP was humiliated and rejected by the people of Bengal? If this is how you plan to capture Bengal, through HATE, BIGOTRY, and XENOPHOBIA, we pity you. The people of Bengal will not just reject you again, they will do so with an even bigger mandate. Mark our words.' On the Delhi incident, the CM said that a 'forced eviction is currently underway' in the colony. 'Speaking Bengali does not make one a Bangladeshi… Having failed in their attempts to deprive Bengalis in West Bengal, the BJP is now exporting their Bangla-Birodhi (anti-Bengali) agenda to other parts of the country in a strategic and systematic manner,' she said. On Monday, TMC Rajya Sabha MP Sagarika Ghosh held a protest at the colony. The TMC's Krishnanagar MP, Mahua Moitra, has also echoed the CM in her response to the Odisha issue. She said such incidents had never occurred in '23 years of Naveen Patnaik's Biju Janata Dal (BJD) government'. 'Since the BJP came to power (in Odisha), this has become a daily occurrence,' she said. Moitra said, 'Fifty per cent of Odisha's tourism revenue comes from Bengali tourists. They are the ones who stay in your hotels, eat at your restaurants, visit your pilgrimage sites. What if Bengali tourists stop going to Odisha?' BJP's response Faced with the TMC marshalling its leaders and workers on the issue, the state BJP has looked to stand its ground. Newly elected Bengal BJP president Samik Bhattacharya alleged that in the Odisha case, 335 of the 444 detained had 'fake documents issued by the TMC'. 'The TMC is flooding India with Bangladeshi infiltrators, who work in other states but return to Bengal just to vote for Mamata Banerjee. Every state must be extremely cautious while hiring labour or employees carrying fake Bengal-issued documents. This is not just a demographic threat, it's a national security concern,' he said. Countering this, the TMC wrote on X that a 'section of the BJP was carrying out a misinformation campaign'. 'If they are 'Bangladeshis', let the Odisha government present documentary proof,' said the party. It called on the BJP to stop 'criminalising an entire community just because they speak Bengali'. Last Friday, the Calcutta High Court sought a detailed report regarding allegations that migrant workers from West Bengal had been detained in Delhi and sent to Bangladesh. 'Have workers belonging to West Bengal been detained from Delhi and sent to Bangladesh?' the court asked. It instructed Chief Secretary Manoj Pant to liaise with his Delhi counterpart and submit a comprehensive report on the matter. As per sources, on June 18, six Bengali-speaking people were detained by the Rohini police in Delhi and taken to the N Katju police station. On Saturday, the TMC continued to ramp up its rhetoric on the topic, writing on X that the BJP was on a mission to 'strip our people of dignity, rights, and shelter' and would render them 'stateless' if it came to power in 2026,
&w=3840&q=100)
First Post
12 minutes ago
- First Post
Watch: US Senator Lindsey Graham warns India, China of 500% tariff 'sledgehammer' over Russia trade
Graham specifically called out India, criticising the South Asian nation for buying discounted Russian oil and 'reselling' it, which he claims indirectly funds Putin's military campaign. read more US Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) speaks to the media, after a Senate GOP lunch, on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, US, June 28, 2025. File Image/Reuters As concerns mount over Russia's ongoing invasion of Ukraine, US Senator Lindsey Graham has warned countries, including India, of severe economic sanctions soon. In an interview on CBS's Face the Nation, Graham disclosed that he and Senator Richard Blumenthal have garnered strong bipartisan support in the Senate for a broad sanctions package aimed at nations supporting Russia's war efforts through trade, particularly in oil and petroleum products. 'This congressional package that we're looking at would give President Trump the ability to impose 500 per cent tariffs on any country that helps Russia, and props up Putin's war machine. He can dial it up or down. He can go to 0 per cent, to 500 per cent. He has maximum flexibility,' said Graham. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD Graham specifically called out India, China, and Brazil, criticising New Delhi for buying discounted Russian oil and 'reselling' it, which he claims indirectly funds Putin's military campaign. 'India buys oil from Russia cheap and resells it. That's despicable,' Graham declared, adding that these nations 'are about to get hurt big time if you keep helping Putin.' He also claimed that the sanctions were actually a 'sledgehammer' available to President Donald Trump to 'go after Putin's economy'. "China, India and Brazil, you are about to get hurt big time if you keep helping Putin" - Trump's on-off friend Senator Lindsey Graham — 𝗗𝗲𝗳𝗲𝗻𝘀𝗲 𝗗𝗮𝗴𝗴𝗲𝗿 (@DefenseDagger) July 14, 2025 This push for tough economic measures comes as Trump considers additional aid for Ukraine, with intelligence reports warning that Russia could make significant territorial gains by next year if Ukraine's drone and artillery supplies remain insufficient. Graham also teased upcoming announcements about arms sales and redirecting seized Russian assets to strengthen Ukraine's defences. 'Stay tuned for a plan where America will start selling large quantities of weapons to our European allies to help Ukraine,' he said. He stressed that, with diplomatic efforts to engage Moscow failing, intense economic pressure might be the only way to end the conflict.
