The Supreme Court of India.
Credit: PTI Photo
New Delhi: In a big relief to the Mamata Banerjee government during the ongoing general elections, the Supreme Court on Tuesday stayed the April 22 Calcutta High Court order, which cancelled the appointment of over 25,000 teachers and non-teaching staff, in state-run and state-aided schools of West Bengal.
The top court, however, allowed the CBI to continue with its investigation into the recruitment scam but restrained it from taking any coercive against either the candidates or the officials.
A bench of Chief Justice of India D Y Chandrachud and Justices J B Pardiwala and Manoj Misra also questioned the West Bengal government, as to why OMR sheets and scanned copies of answer sheets had been destroyed.
"You were duty-bound to maintain the documents in digitised form. Now, it is obvious that there is no data," the bench told the state counsel.
The bench also observed, "The public job is so scarce. Nothing remains if the faith of the public goes. This is systemic fraud."
After hearing the counsel, the bench said the matter would require closer look to ascertain whether those appointment, which suffered from any taint, can be segregated.
If such segregation is possible then it would be wrong to set aside the entirety of the process, the bench pointed out.
Having noted that a large number of teachers would be affected, the bench said if such a segregation is possible, this court has to set out the modalities to determine the process.
The court explained it was willing to continue the interim protection granted to the candidates, subject to the stipulation that anyone found to have been appointed illegally and continued as a consequence of the present order would refund the salary.
During the hearing of appeal by the West Bengal government, the court asked it as why it created supernumerary posts and hired wait-listed candidates when the selection process itself was under challenge in court.
The court fixed the matter for consideration on July 16.
Reacting to the development, WB Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said in a post on X, "I am really very happy and mentally relaxed on receipt of justice at the highest Court of the land. Congratulations to the entire teaching fraternity and my humble regards to the Hon'ble Supreme Court of India."
On April 29, the top court had stayed the CBI probe against West Bengal government officials in the teachers' recruitment case.
The West Bengal government challenged the validity of the HC's order invalidating the appointment of 25,753 teachers and non-teaching staff made by the School Service Commission (SSC) in state-run and state-aided schools.
The high court had said the CBI would undertake further investigations with regard to the persons involved in the state government approving the creation of a supernumerary post to accommodate illegal appointments.
The state government claimed the HC failed to appreciate the ramification of cancelling the entire selection process, leading to straightaway termination of teaching and non-teaching staff from service with immediate effect, without giving sufficient time to the petitioner state to deal with such an exigency, rendering the education system at a standstill.
The HC's division bench had ordered cancellation of all appointments made through the recruitment process of State Level Selection Test-2016 (SLST) in government and aided schools, declaring it as "null and void". It had also directed the selected candidates to refund the salaries paid to them.