‘End ego battle, admit Safiya’: HC pulls up WBBSE over Nandigram girl’s edu row
Times of India | 15 July 2026
Kolkata: “How long will a girl have to fight to get education?” the Calcutta high court on Tuesday asked while sharply criticising the West Bengal Board of Secondary Education (WBBSE) over the continued delay in securing class 10 admission for Nandigram’s Safiya Hassan, whose education was disrupted after her school was found to be unrecognised for secondary classes.
Hearing a contempt petition, the division bench of acting chief justice Tapabrata Chakraborty and Justice Partha Sarathi Chatterjee was informed that Safiya was still being denied admission to Contai Hindu Girls’ School as the Board had not granted permission.
When the Board’s counsel argued that the school must first seek approval, the acting chief justice remarked, “Let us not make it an ego battle.”
“Writ petition, appeal, contempt...How long a girl will fight for taking education... Is it not unbecoming of statutory authorities that in our country 16-15 years girls, how much financial capacity they have, tell us. Writ petition, three rounds of litigation. Your officer does not understand that he is getting a salary from the state exchequer. You are the elder brother under whom everything goes on. There is no prestige issue. The board will command the school that when the High Court has directed you, you have to do it, send me (Board) a letter and I (Board) will do it. Finish. The girl happily continues with the class,” the acting chief justice observed.
Safiya, represented by her father Sk Tabrikul Islam, a daily wage labourer, had moved the HC in 2025 after her school, Nandkumar Jeevanrao STPN High School in East Midnapore was barred from running classes 9 and 10 as it had recognition only up to class 8.
Though promoted to class 10, the Board refused her Madhyamik registration, citing two years of study in an unrecognised institution. In 2026, the HC treated her case as exceptional and directed the Board to facilitate her admission to another school so she could appear for the 2027 Madhyamik examination. However, the court noted that the order remains unimplemented despite repeated directions.