Bigger rats will emerge in Bengal teachers' scam: Calcutta High Court judge

Kolkata: Justice Abhijit Gangopadhyay of Calcutta High Court, while hearing the case related to multi-crore teachers' recruitment scam in West Bengal said on Thursday that bigger rats involved in the corruption will emerge during the course of investigation.

On Thursday, he directed the West Bengal School Service Commission (WBSSC) to publish the names of 183 candidates deemed by the commission to have illegally procured teachers' jobs for the 9th and 10th standards in state-run schools on the commission's website within the next 24 hours.

He also directed the commission to seek the details of the current placements of these 183 candidates from the respective district school inspectors and within the next three days and submit a detailed report to his bench by December 14.

At the same time, Justice Gangopadhyay also addressed the issue of huge difference in the figures given by WBSSC and Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on the number of illegal recruitments in the 9th and 10th standards.

While WBSSC's figure quotes the figure at 183, the CBI's list quotes the same at 952.

Justice Gangopadhyay asked the counsels of three parties namely CBI, WBSSC and the petitioners in the case to sit together on December 3, discuss the documents like optical marks recognition (OMR) sheets and hard discs seized or recovered in the matter and settle out the matter related to difference in the two figures.

Justice Gangopadhyay also directed the CBI to submit a report to his bench on the result of the joint findings.

Thereafter, Justice Gangopadhyay asked all the parties concerned not to be scared as bigger rats will emerge during the course of investigation.

"Do not be afraid. More and bigger rats will emerge," Justice Gangopadhyay said.

Incidentally, this is not the first time that Justice Gangopadhyay is not making such a comment hinting towards involvement of "bigger influences" in the scam.

On November 3, he made a similar comment within the court as he said that everyone knows who are the real culprits behind the scam and at times he wonders whether the real masterminds behind this will be nabbed during his lifetime.