The commissioner of school education has sent the district inspectors of schools in six districts more names of sacked teachers who cannot return to school.
The names had been “inadvertently” included in the list drawn up by the school service commission on Wednesday.
The notice, sent to the district inspectors of schools of North-24 Parganas, Cooch Behar, North Dinajpur, East Midnapore, West Midnapore and Murshidabad
on April 25, said: “I would like to inform you that the chairman, WBSSC (West Bengal School Service Commission), vide his memo... dated 25/04/2025, has forwarded a list of candidates whose names have been inadvertently included in the list of candidates who have ‘not been specifically found to be tainted’. The chairman, WBSSC, has requested to exclude the said names from the lists.”
“The said list is, therefore, forwarded to you for taking necessary action.”
Teachers “not specifically found to be tainted” are eligible to go to school and draw salaries till December 31.
The SSC drew up the list in pursuance of the Supreme Court’s April 17 order, accepting the plea of the state secondary education board to let teachers “not specifically found to be tainted” continue till the end of the academic year.
The earlier list drawn up by the SSC for 24 districts put the figure at 15,403.
Sources in the SSC said some names have been further excluded from the list.
Officials conceded they had “spotted several mistakes” in the earlier list.
Sources in the school education department tried to justify the mistakes.
“SSC chairman Siddahrtha Majumdar was kept in confinement for almost two days by the aggrieved teachers. In such a situation, mistakes are bound to happen. Considering the tremendous workload of the commission, the state government on Friday appointed a secretary at the commission to assist the chairman,” said an official.
Such mistakes have cost job seekers dearly over the past few years. “The SSC almost seems incapable of doing an error-free job. They don’t take their work seriously,” said a sacked teacher.
Sources in the SSC said some names have been excluded and “some names could be added” as these names “got dropped inadvertently”.
A group led by Chinmoy Mandal, a protesting former teacher, had alleged lapses in the first list.
“If the allegations of lapses prove to be true, some names could be added to the list,” an SSC official said.