WBSSC faces Calcutta HC’s ire over unsatisfactory report in school job scam

Kolkata : The West Bengal School Service Commission (WBSSC) authorities, on Monday, faced the ire of a Division Bench of the Calcutta High Court for an unsatisfactory and incomplete report on the school job recruitment irregularities case that had been submitted to the court.

The Division Bench of Justice Debangsu Basak and Justice Shabbar Rashidi even observed that in the last report filed in court, the third such report filed by the commission, the WBSSC seemed to have made an attempt to hide a lot of things.

Justice Basak and Justice Rashidi also directed the commission to file its fourth report within the next 48 hours as the matter will come up for hearing again on December 20.

The Division Bench of Justice Basak and Justice Rashidi is a Special Bench constituted by the Calcutta High Court’s TS Sivagnanam to hear the cases relating to the multi-crore cash-for-school job case in West Bengal.

The Special Bench was constituted following a direction from the Supreme Court in the matter. Earlier, several secondary teachers in different state-run schools in West Bengal lost their jobs following an order of the Calcutta High Court.

The job-losers subsequently approached the Supreme Court of India challenging that order. However, the apex court returned the matter back to the Calcutta court and directed that it be heard by a new Special Bench of the High Court.

On the very first day of hearing in the matter, Justice Basak and Justice Rashidi directed the WBSSC authorities to file a report with their observations in the matter. They also directed the WBSSC to state the steps taken by the commission in case of irregularities identified by them. However, the court was not satisfied with any of the reports filed by the commission in the matter so far.