School jobs: HC raps CBI, seeks report on sanctioning authority
Times of India | 4 May 2024
Kolkata: Calcutta High Court was in for a surprise on Friday, a day after it came down heavily on the chief secretary for sitting on the request for grant of sanction to CBI to start trial proceedings against state officials accused in the cash-for-jobs case.
A division bench of justices Joymalya Bagchi and Gaurang Kanth came to know that at least two accused in custody — namely former West Bengal School Service Commission chairman Subires Bhattacharyya and former West Bengal Board of Secondary Education president Kalyanmoy Ganguly — had been appointed by the Bengal governor and not the chief secretary.The governor, therefore, was the authority to grant sanction to the proceedings against them.
The information came to the fore after counsel for the duo, Sandipan Ganguly, placed the notifications of their appointments in court.
“As per law, sanction has to be obtained from the governor (for the two cases) and not the chief secretary. We were under the impression till Thursday that they had been appointed by the school education department and, therefore, the chief secretary was the controlling authority. Even the chief secretary in his report didn’t say anything,” Justice Bagchi said.
Dismayed with the CBI, Justice Bagchi said: “You are the prosecuting authority. You don’t know who the sanctioning authority is? This is atrocious.”
Justice Bagchi recalled the submission made by the ASG stating that CBI had obtained sanction from the governor to proceed against former minister Partha Chatterjee but the sanction from the CS was awaited.
To clear the confusion, the division bench directed deputy solicitor general Dhiraj Trivedi, representing the CBI, to submit a report on Tuesday stating the sanctioning authority for each of the accused in custody. Counsel Ganguly sought the court’s leave to withdraw the bail applications and move them after the expiry of seven weeks, which the CS had sought on Thursday.