Justice Biswajit Basu of Calcutta High Court on Wednesday set aside the state education department's decision to regularise the appointment of 313 "voluntary" teachers in state-aided secondary schools within the ambit of the Gorkhaland Territorial Administration (GTA).
The teachers were appointed in 2019 when Partha Chatterjee was the state education minister.
The judge also made it clear that after the day's order, these teachers cannot continue in their jobs.
The judge in his order stated that the ongoing CID proceedings in the case would continue, especially against the former district inspector of hill schools.
"Since the scam is serious in nature, the investigation should be allowed to continue," Justice Basu observed.
The row over the process to appoint teachers in schools in the hills has been on for long. This is independent of the School Service Commission (SSC) controversy rocking Bengal.
Ever since the SSC became defunct in 2003 in the hills, several schools engaged voluntary teachers purportedly to fill these vacant posts.
Even before that, the system to appoint "voluntary teachers" was in place, ever since the Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council (DGHC) was formed in 1988. It continued even after the GTA was formed in 2012.
However, the DGHC in 2010 and the GTA in 2018 had both issued orders directing schools to stop appointing “voluntary teachers”. In fact, the GTA had even acknowledged the illegality in the process.
On June 25, 2018, the executive director of GTA education department wrote a letter to all school heads (Memo.No. 302 (899)/GTA-EDCN/2017-18) stating that “during scrutiny", it came to notice of the authority that in many cases the candidates engaged without authorisation “do not possess requisite qualifications either; or, were whimsically introduced on violation of earlier Order No 01/1-2/EDN/DGHC/2010-11 dt. 30.07.2010 of the Secretary, Education Department of DGHC” and henceforth the GTA will not entertain or allow engagement of voluntary teachers.
Different groups in the hills have alleged that many who were not voluntary teachers or not even staying in the hills or were working abroad got their jobs regularised in 2019. Apart from family members of political leaders, there are allegations that jobs of relatives of some schoolteachers were also illegally regularised.
Some deprived candidates had moved court demanding a probe into the alleged recruitment scam in the GTA in 2019.
Anit Thapa, chief executive, Gorkhaland Territorial Administration (GTA), batted for the teachers. When the appointments took place, Thapa chaired the board of administrators of the GTA and was a leader of the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha (Binay Tamang faction).
“This is a legal battle, and I will stand by you,” said Thapa, who added that the problem lay in the absence of clear recruitment rules for hill teachers.
Thapa hinted that he would back the teachers to approach the divisional bench and even the Supreme Court if need be.
Protesting against the order, the Sanyukta Madhyamik Sikshak Sangathan announced “an indefinite” closure of all schools in the hills as part of their “first phase of the agitation”.
Some hill schools are holding their annual exams, though most are closed for three months of winter vacations.
The Opposition is expected to use the verdict to attack the Mamata Banerjee government on the issue of corruption. BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari lost no time to take to X to hail the judgment and attack the government.
"Corruption seems to have percolated through length and breadth of West Bengal. In a historic Judgment delivered today, the Hon'ble Justice Biswajit Basu has been pleased to set aside and quash the regularisation by GTA upon State's approval of 313 Volunteer Teachers by declaring it illegal. It is an apathy that ordinary people in Bengal are suffering time and again owing to the corrupt mischiefs by the State and its blue eyed persons occupying the GTA. I welcome the verdict of the Hon’ble Court which has ensured triumph of truth," Adhikari wrote in X on Wednesday.