– Mita Mukherjee

The Supreme Court on Thursday directed the Bengal government to allow all “untainted teachers” who wrote the 2016 State School Service Commission (SSC) examination, to appear in the fresh selection process. The court further directed that these candidates will not have to fulfil the enhanced minimum 50 percent marks in graduation and in post-graduation bringing relief to all such (untainted) candidates.

The court also extended the deadline for submitting applications by ten days for “untainted” teachers and postponed the selection process. The window for applying for the fresh selection had closed on July 21.

The minimum cut off percentage was 40 percent in the earlier exam which was increased to 50 percent for the ongoing selection test.

The fresh selection process began in May this year after the apex court, upholding Calcutta High Court’s order scrapping the appointment of over 25,000 teachers stating that the entire 2016 selection process was “vitiated”. 

But, a bench of Justice Sanjay Kumar and Justice Satish Chandra Sharma dismissed petitions from several applicants who had not taken part in the earlier examination but sought age-relaxation beyond the 40- year limit for the fresh ongoing recruitment process that started in May.

The Supreme Court during the hearing on Thursday criticised the Bengal government with the way “untainted” teachers were forced to approach the Supreme Court for the large-scale irregularities in the previous selection process quashed by the high court.

The Supreme Court had earlier directed that all “untainted” candidates would be allowed to continue to work till December 31, 2025. The top court made it clear on Thursday that all candidates who were permitted to continue till December 31 will be allowed to participate in the fresh test.

The fresh written test for recruiting assistant teachers to fill 35,726 posts for classes IX and X will be held on September 7 and that for classes XI and XII on September 14. Nearly 5.8 lakh candidates have applied of whom 13,000 are the “untainted” teachers of the earlier 2016 panel.

The next hearing of the matter will be held at the Supreme Court on October 31.

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