Several petitioners on Wednesday moved the Supreme Court against the decision to cancel the appointment of 25,753 teachers and non-teaching staff in government and aided schools in West Bengal, arguing that the Calcutta High Court’s decision will adversely affect the lives and livelihood of the innocent candidates. Is lying.
A bench of Chief Justice Sanjiv Khanna and Justice Sanjay Kumar heard around 124 petitions challenging the Calcutta High Court decision. The Chief Justice accepted the arguments and noted the need for a balance between dealing with illegalities and making appointments in which there were no irregularities.
The Court said that wherever possible, separation of cases may be preferred to protect innocent candidates. Referring to the High Court judgment, the bench said, “It only says that when there were so many irregularities, it has become impossible to know whose appointment is correct and whose appointment process has been tampered with.” ‘
A common argument raised was that most of the innocent selected candidates adversely affected by the High Court order have now crossed the age limit required to appear in any competitive examination as the impugned recruitment process was of 2016.
The case stems from alleged irregularities in the 2016 recruitment process conducted by the West Bengal School Service Commission (SSC). The controversy revolves around alleged corruption in the State Level Selection Examination-2016.
A total of 23 lakh candidates had participated for 24,640 posts, while a total of 25,753 appointment letters were issued. The Calcutta High Court invalidated the appointments in April, 2024, citing irregularities like tampering of ‘OMR sheets’ and rank-jumping.
Several senior advocates including Dushyant Dave, Mukul Rohatgi, Kapil Sibal, Vikas Singh and Maneka Guruswamy presented arguments on behalf of the petitioners. The bench has heard the arguments of the petitioners’ lawyers and will resume the proceedings on January 27 at 2 pm.
