On Monday, April 22, the Calcutta High Court will rule on appeals and petitions concerning purported anomalies in the 2016 recruiting process that resulted in the selection of applicants for government-sponsored and assisted secondary and higher secondary schools in West Bengal.
Following a high court ruling, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) began an investigation into the case and detained former state education minister Partha Chatterjee as well as a few officials who worked for the West Bengal School Service Commission (SSC) at the time of the alleged scam.
According to a high court official, a division bench made up of justices Debangsu Basak and Md Shabbar Rashidi will rule on Monday, April 22, on several petitions and appeals related to the selection and appointment process for school employment that were heard simultaneously, PTI reports.
The Supreme Court directed the Chief Justice of the High Court to form the division bench, which then heard an extensive number of petitions and appeals regarding the State Level Selection Test-2016 (SLST) candidates chosen for appointment by the SSC as teachers of Classes IX, X, XI, and XII, as well as Group C and D staffers.
On March 20, the division bench adjourned the hearings in these cases and reserved the ruling.
In response to writ petitions from candidates who took part in the SLST-2016 but were not selected for jobs, a single bench led by Justice Abhijit Gangopadhyay ordered the CBI to look into claims of anomalies in the hiring procedure.
After noticing inconsistencies, the high court also issued an order terminating the employment of several teaching and non-teaching staff members.
To address the petitions it had received concerning these matters, the Supreme Court had asked the Chief Justice of the Calcutta High Court to form a division bench on November 9, 2023, to hear all of the appeals and petitions related to the hiring procedure through SLST-2016 and provide prompt resolution.
To give the division bench time to decide on the disputes, the Supreme Court's judgment protected the appointments, which the high court had cancelled, for six months.
Following the Supreme Court's order to complete the investigation into the matters within two months of the date of its ruling, the CBI finished the inquiry and presented a report to the high court.
