Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Wednesday welcomed the Calcutta High Court’s order setting aside a previous ruling that had annulled the appointments of 32,000 primary school teachers for alleged irregularities, calling the verdict a “humanitarian” relief for thousands of families.
The BJP, however, said the judgment has triggered “fresh questions” among unemployed youth and vowed to continue the legal battle.
Speaking in Malda, the CM said the division bench’s decision brought immense relief to thousands of young teachers recruited through the 2014 Teachers’ Eligibility Test (TET). “We are happy with the court’s order. It is a great relief that the jobs of these teachers are saved. We want to generate jobs and not take them away,” she said.
“The judges have viewed the matter from a humanitarian angle. The families of these teachers have been protected. I am happy. It is not right to run to court every time to take away someone’s job,” she added.
The Supreme Court had in April cancelled the appointment of nearly 26,000 teaching and non-teaching staff in state-run and -aided institutions after finding that the selection process was tainted.
The now-overturned order was originally passed by a single bench led by then-Justice Abhijit Gangopadhyay, who later resigned from the judiciary and joined politics. He is currently the BJP MP from Tamluk. Asked about him, Banerjee declined to comment.
“I will not say anything about anyone. The important thing is that the jobs of my young brothers and sisters have been saved,” she said, adding, “Judgments will follow the law, and we respect the courts.”
Education Minister Bratya Basu said truth has prevailed, and their jobs remained “safe and secure”. Basu also said that anyone can move the Supreme Court against this order but, he claimed, it “would identify the saboteurs behind any honest recruitment drive undertaken by the state government”.
He later said the division bench’s order proved beyond doubt the process by recruitment boards had always been fair and transparent and there were attempts by some quarters to “defeat the very purpose and objective of the Mamata Banerjee government to create more teaching job vacancies for educated, qualified youth of the state.”
BJP spokesperson and one of the petitioners in the case, Tarunjyoti Tewari, said he has full respect for the court order, but the verdict has raised new doubts among job aspirants who have been alleging corruption in the recruitment process for years. “What needs to be said about the Calcutta High Court order will be said in the Supreme Court,” Tewari, a lawyer and one of the petitioners in the case, said on X.
“Today’s verdict has created fresh questions in the minds of Bengal’s unemployed youth. Corruption has been given institutional legitimacy,” he said.
Citing the bench’s observations, Tewari said the court had upheld the appointments on the grounds that innocent candidates should not lose their jobs due to the authorities’ faults. “Humanity and justice are not the same thing,” he argued. “What about the families of those who were deprived?” He said several Supreme Court judgments have made clear that appointments tainted by corruption cannot stand.