KOLKATA: Days after the Supreme Court Division Bench of Chief Justice of India Sanjeev Khanna and Justice Sanjay Kumar ruled that 25,753 teaching and non-teaching staff recruited in West Bengal through a process riddled with corruption, manipulation, and fraud stand sacked, many job-losers, lawyers and politicians are convinced that it was due to a plan hatched by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and her advisers to save her Trinamool Congress members who allegedly collected money from the job applicants.
On Thursday, faced with the impossible task of detecting those who had paid money allegedly to Trinamool Congress cadres doubling as money collectors and those who had got the jobs on merit, the Supreme Court opted to cancel the appointments of all the 25,753 teachers and non-teaching staff who were selected in 2016.
The apex court reiterated the finding of a Calcutta High Court Division Bench that due to the lack of cooperation from the West Bengal government and its Staff Selection Commission, it was impossible to “separate the wheat from the chaff”. The apex court said that non-tainted candidates could apply afresh in a new recruitment process within six months, while the tainted ones would have to return all the money they had received since appointment, plus interest.
Thursday’s mass job terminations have sparked anger and anxiety among affected teachers and staff who face the daunting prospect of losing their livelihoods and social prestige. Despair, hopelessness and dismay are writ large on the faces of the teachers who lost their jobs following the Supreme Court judgement.
After the verdict, Mamata Banerjee said: “It is not only about 26,000 losing their jobs. It is about 26,000 families involving lakhs of people. Our government will stand by these families.”
However, job-losers are not convinced.
Sangeeta Sinha, a 40-year-old, used to teach life sciences in a school in Diamond Harbour, 50 km from Kolkata, said: “I worked hard, with honesty, to crack the exam. I will always be identified as part of the tainted 2016 batch.” “After I joined my school, I heard that some of my colleagues had paid lakhs to Trinamool Congress leaders to get the appointment,” she alleged.
Chinmoy Mondal, who taught English at a school in Halisahar in North 24-Parganas, is downcast. “The crime was committed by a few. Why should even the honest candidates be punished?” he asked.
Aditi Basu was a mathematics teacher at a Dakshineswar school, who left her job in a private school for the “security of a government job”. That security lies in tatters today.
Atanu Naskar, from Mama-Bhagne village in North 24-Parganas district, confesses that his family paid Rs 10 lakhs allegedly to the local Trinamool leader for a teacher’s job. “I was specifically told to submit a blank OMR. The TMC leader told me that giving an appointment was easier that way.”
Many people in his village allege that each month, sacks full of money would be sent to Trinamool leaders in Kolkata by the collectors along with the particulars of the candidates.
Sudipto Dasgupta, a lawyer representing the candidates who did not get jobs because of the irregularities in the recruitment process conducted by the SSC, said: “It is unfortunate that the deserving candidates had to suffer because the state attempted to cover up the irregularities.”
Firdous Samim, the lawyer who was the first to petition the Court on the irregularities on behalf of his client Baishakhi Bhattacharyya (Chatterjee), is more forthright. “I would urge all those who paid money to Trinamool Congress leaders to catch them and ask for their money back. Tie them to trees, and do not let them go till they return your money,” he advises. “The Calcutta High Court and the Supreme Court asked the government’s lawyers repeatedly to furnish a list of tainted candidates. They did not.”
Leader of Opposition Suvendu Adhikari held the state government and the SSC responsible for the mass job cancellations.
“In Bengali, we have a saying that it is the thief’s mother who speaks the loudest. Listening to Mamata Banerjee, we can understand how true it is,” he said, referring to the Chief Minister’s press conference on Thursday where she accused the BJP and the CPM of orchestrating a crisis in the state education sector.
He further alleged that “most of the SSC work was carried out from the house in Naktala,” a reference aimed at former Education Minister Partha Chatterjee.
“Partha Chatterjee was specifically chosen by Mamata to perpetrate the racket. So, he destroyed the entire SSC recruitment process. Various officers of the Chief Minister’s Office were associated with Partha. Mamata Banerjee and Abhishek Banerjee are the direct beneficiaries of this huge racket of at least Rs 800 crore,” he alleged.
The Enforcement Directorate arrested Chatterjee on July 23, 2022, in connection with the school jobs scam. The agency also arrested Chatterjee’s close aide Arpita Mukherjee, from whose property Rs 21 crore in cash was seized during a raid.
Chatterjee was the Education Minister when the SSC appointment irregularities took place
The Trinamool Congress has labelled all these allegations as fake and agenda driven.
CPM Rajya Sabha MP and lawyer Bikash Bhattacharya argued in court for the aggrieved candidates who were bypassed by the tainted ones in the recruitment process. On Thursday, Mamata Banerjee directly blamed him for the loss of over 25,000 jobs.
Speaking to The Sunday Guardian, Bhattacharya alleged: “Mamata and her gang masterminded this massive scam. Though the courts repeatedly asked the government to furnish details of candidates who got the jobs through unfair means, they kept on giving different figures. They even told the courts that they could not guarantee that even those who were not on the untainted list were honest. This forced the Court to cancel the entire panel. Had the Mamata government given the actual figures of those who got jobs by paying money, the people would have lynched them. That is why Mamata chose to sacrifice thousands of innocent job-holders.”