A section of teachers and staff who lost their jobs following a Supreme Court verdict annulling their appointments began a relay hunger strike on Thursday outside the West Bengal School Service Commission (SSC) office in Salt Lake, Kolkata. The protest follows a judgment that declared the entire 2016 SSC recruitment process as “tainted and vitiated.”
The protesters, many of whom had gathered outside the SSC office building ‘Acharya Sadan’ since Wednesday night, expressed outrage not only over their dismissal but also over the alleged police action against fellow demonstrators outside the district inspector (DI) of schools’ office at Kasba on Wednesday. Teachers claimed they were baton-charged, kicked, and manhandled by law enforcement officers during the demonstration near Kasba Police Station.
Joining the protestors, BJP MP and former Calcutta High Court judge Abhijit Gangopadhyay criticized the state administration, holding it accountable for the crisis. “Cases have been lodged against innocent teachers who lost their jobs due to the illegal acts of others,” Gangopadhyay said. He was accompanied by former Rajya Sabha MP Rupa Ganguly to the protest site, extending solidarity with the aggrieved educators.
Gangopadhyay clarified that he had deliberately chosen not to meet Education Minister Bratya Basu on Wednesday in protest of the police’s handling of the demonstrations. He added that the BJP leadership supported his stance.
As a judge, Gangopadhyay had ordered a CBI investigation in 2021 into alleged recruitment irregularities, which led to the termination of more than 25,000 teaching and non-teaching posts in state-run and state-aided schools. This decision was later upheld by a division bench of the Calcutta High Court and affirmed by the Supreme Court on April 3, 2024.
The protesters contend that the SSC failed to distinguish between fraudulently appointed candidates and those who were rightfully recruited, thereby unjustly affecting many innocent individuals.
The scam led to the arrests of former West Bengal Education Minister Partha Chatterjee and others involved with the SSC during the controversial recruitment period, with both the CBI and Enforcement Directorate continuing their investigations into the matter.
