Recruitment case: WB School Service Commission releases tainted candidates’ list

Kolkata: The West Bengal School Service Commission (WBSSC) on Saturday released a list of tainted candidates who paid bribes to secure jobs in government-run schools in 2016. The list has 1,804 names, officials said.

This comes two days after a bench of Justices Sanjay Kumar and Satish Chandra Sharma of Supreme Court directed the state government to publish the list of tainted candidates.

“In compliance with the order of the Supreme Court, a list of candidates whose selection was set aide by the Calcutta high court and confirmed by the Supreme Court was published on Saturday in the commission’s website,” said a senior official of WBSSC.

The appointments of all 25,752 school teachers and non-teaching staff (Group-C and D) from the 2016 recruitment panel were cancelled by the bench of the Chief Justice of India Sanjeev Khanna on April 3.

On an appeal by the state, the CJI’s bench said on April 17 that only the non-tainted teachers may be allowed to continue in service until December 31 but they must go through a fresh selection test in the meantime. The fresh exam is likely to be held on September 7 and 14.

The state government has assured the apex court that none of the tainted candidates would be allowed to appear in the fresh recruitment exams scheduled next month, an official said.

The alleged corruption is being probed by the Central Bureau of Investigation and Enforcement Directorate following an order the Calcutta high court passed in May 2022. Around a dozen TMC leaders, including former education minister Partha Chatterjee, figure among those arrested so far.