The education department has informed Calcutta High Court that it has identified 1,177 vacant upper-primary posts (Classes VI to VIII) in government-aided schools that can be filled by the school service commission (SSC).
The department's counsel on May 21 told a division bench of Justice Partha Sarathi Chatterjee and Justice Tapabrata Chakraborty that the vacancies would be immediately forwarded to the SSC so that "necessary follow-up steps can be taken for counselling...".
The department submitted the vacancy figure before the division bench while hearing a contempt petition alleging non-compliance with the court’s order to fill 14,052 posts.
On August 29, 2024, a division bench headed by Justice Tapabrata Chakraborty directed the SSC to fill the vacant posts within 12 weeks from the date of the order.
However, as appointments to 1,177 assistant teacher posts remained pending during the tenure of the Mamata Banerjee government, a teaching job aspirant filed a contempt petition.
Sushanta Ghosh, the petitioner, said that although the previous government gave appointments to 12,723 candidates, the process for the remaining posts was not completed as the department did not identify the vacancy.
The department is responsible for determining vacancies in each school.
“We are happy that the department under the new government has identified the vacancies and promised to forward them to the SSC,” Ghosh said.
Sources in the commission said on Wednesday that they had yet to receive the vacancy figures from the department.
"Once the vacancy figure is reached, counselling will be held immediately, so the candidates can be recommended at the earliest," said a source.
The court has asked the commission's secretary and the commissioner of school education to give their status report on the appointment on June 22, when the case will be heard again.
The candidates who are awaiting appointment wrote the 2015 Teachers Eligibility Test (TET), which was held in 2016.
No one could be recruited before the court gave its order in August 2024 because of a barrage of petitions against the recruitment process, citing alleged irregularities.
The petitioner said the division bench, in its order in September last year, said that the recruitment against the 1,177 vacant posts should be completed by November 19.
Then several more deadlines were given.
"However, the commission and the department did not do anything to identify the posts. Finally, the department on May 21 apprised the court that the process had been completed. But till Wednesday, the identified vacancies have not been forwarded to the commission. We are unsure whether the recruitment will be over by June 22," said Ghosh, the petitioner.