Thousands of aggrieved teachers and school staff had arrived outside Netaji Indoor Stadium on Monday morning.
Only a section of them made it in. The others did not have a pass that proclaimed “we are deserving”.
Protests followed, guardrail barricades were broken and tempers flared.
Groups of aggrieved school staff were pouncing on each other until police pulled them apart.
The police scanned each pass, issued by an association of the aggrieved.
Bags were not allowed inside, forcing the school staff to leave them on pavements or hanging on trees outside the venue.
Tensions started building much before the meeting started at noon, with the tussle between the “deserving” and the rest.
“The undeserving candidates have usurped our passes, like they cost us our jobs,” said Rina Lohar, who came from Rampurhat in Birbhum.
She left home at 4.30am to catch a train. She could not enter the stadium despite waiting for over an hour.
For the 100-odd minutes the meeting went on for, scenes of despair, anxiety and helplessness were aplenty.
Long wait
The police struggled to streamline the throngs of aggrieved school staff at the gates of Netaji Indoor stadium on Monday morning.
The crowd broke through the guardrail barricades.
Some, like Priyanka Dey, were in tears.
“We were told that passes would be given outside the stadium this morning. I reached before 9am. But I did not get a pass,” said Dey. She taught at a higher secondary school in Kakdwip, South 24-Parganas, around 90km from the heart of the city.
Dey came from Baruipur on the southern fringes of the city.
Lopamudra Paul, who taught geography at a Murshidabad school, was furious. On Sunday night, she was given a piece of paper from the Deserving Teachers’ Rights Platform. She had been told that she would get an admission pass on the production of the chit at the gates on Monday.
When the time came, the cops turned her away, saying the chit was not valid.
“The chief minister never mentioned anything about passes. Then where does the question arise from?” she asked.
Hanging: bags & future
Teachers with passes were let in. Their bags weren’t.
“Should we leave the bags here like this?” a teacher asked another.
“Our jobs have been stolen. What difference can a bag make?” a teacher said as he left his bag on the pavement and moved towards the meeting venue.
By 11am, hundreds of bags — backpacks to sling bags — were dumped on that slice of pavement. Many were also left hanging from branches of trees near the gates.
Back and forward
Dhitesh Mandal, one of the members of the Deserving Teachers’ Rights Platform, could not fathom a contradiction.
“The Supreme Court can decide what was under a shrine hundreds of years ago. But the same court cannot make a clear distinction between deserving and undeserving candidates. This, despite the CBI and SSC giving several inputs. It is baffling,” said Mandal.
Soumitra Ghosh, who lost his job as a chemistry teacher at a school in Howrah, was walking towards the venue hurriedly.
Ghosh and his wife were both recruited from the 2016 SSC panel. Now, both have lost their jobs. His wife taught chemistry at a school in Tarakeswar in Hooghly.
“I have come here in the hope of a solution. I want to look forward... A fresh recruitment test or any other alternative is fine by me. But whatever happens should happen immediately. I dread a long and futile wait,” he said.
Salary SOS
On his way out of the stadium, state education minister Bratya Basu was met with fervent appeals for help from the aggrieved.
“Sir, will we continue to get our salary?” asked someone from the stands.
The minister looked up and replied: “We have never said that the disbursal of salaries will be stopped. Then why are you worried? Have faith in us. Everything will be resolved,” he said.