School jobs: HC to hear contempt plea against WB School Education Department for not uploading OMR sheets

KOLKATA: The Calcutta High Court on Monday said it will on Wednesday hear a contempt petition against the West Bengal Department of School Education, claiming that it has not uploaded OMR sheets of 26,000 teaching and non-teaching staff who lost their jobs following a Supreme Court judgment.

Alleging that the department violated the 2024 judgment of the high court and the subsequent “modified” verdict of the apex court, the petitioners filed the plea before a division bench presided by Justice Debangsu Basak.

The petitioners claimed that the Optical Mark Recognition (OMR) sheets available in three hard disks have not been uploaded on the website of the West Bengal School Service Commission (SSC) "forthwith" and made available to the public, as was ordered by the bench, also comprising Justice Md Shabbar Rashidi.

The bench also asked the additional solicitor general to assist the HC on Wednesday with regard to certain directions to the CBI in the April 22, 2024 judgment. The judgment had directed the CBI to undertake further investigation in respect of the irregularities in the appointment process.

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"CBI will interrogate all persons who had received appointments beyond the panel, after expiry of the panel and after submitting blank OMR sheets. If necessary, CBI shall undertake custodial interrogation in respect of each of them," the division bench had directed.

The petitioners also claimed violation of the high court's 2024 direction that persons who had been appointed outside the panel, after expiry of the panel as also those who submitted blank OMR sheets but obtained appointments, must return all remunerations and benefits received by them to the state exchequer along with interest calculated at 12 percent per annum within a period of four weeks from the date of the judgment.

The Supreme Court judgment of April 3 invalidated the appointment of 25,753 teachers and staffers in various West Bengal government-run and aided schools, terming the entire selection process "vitiated and tainted". The top court on April 17 extended till December 31 the services of terminated teachers found “untainted” by the CBI.