A high court division bench on Thursday asked the state government to inform it by Monday whether it was ready to withdraw the special leave petition (SLP) before the Supreme Court against an order allowing the CBI and the ED to probe the alleged illegal recruitments in municipalities.
The bench, headed by Justice Tapabrata Chakraborty, held that since the SLP before the Supreme Court was pending and would be heard in July, a subordinate division bench should not hear the case at this stage.
On April 21, during the hearing of a case related to irregularities in recruitments in government-aided schools, the ED had informed Justice Abhijit Gangopadhyay of the high court that documents seized during a raid had revealed that jobs were up for sale in various municipalities.
The agency, along with the CBI, had prayed to Justice Gangopadhyay for a separate case on the municipal recruitments. The judge granted the prayer.
The state moved an SLP against the order in the Supreme Court.
The state also moved Calcutta High Court seeking an interim stay on Justice Gangopadhyay’s order.
During the hearing, lawyers appearing for the ED and the CBI informed the division bench that the state had already moved the Supreme Court against the order.
Kalyan Banerjee, who appeared for the state government, told the judge that the CBI began raiding municipalities soon after the division bench fixed the date for hearing. On Thursday, CBI officials said they had collected several documents from at least 15 municipalities related to appointments that were made through ABS Infozone, a company owned by Ayan Sil, on Wednesday.
Sil was earlier arrested for his alleged role in corruption in school recruitments.
Forest recruitment
A division bench of Calcutta High Court on Thursday restrained the state forest department from initiating a fresh process to recruit of forest assistants till further orders.
The division bench, headed by Justice V.M. Velumani, also stayed an order passed by a single-judge bench of the high court cancelling a panel of 2,000 candidates for the posts.
