The list of 1,806 "tainted" teachers from the alleged 2016 recruitment scam released by the SSC following an order by the Supreme Court prompted the Trinamool Congress and Bengal's Opposition parties, the BJP and CPM, to trade charges.

The SSC on Saturday night released the names of 1,804 candidates on its website, citing the directive of the apex court.

On Sunday morning, it uploaded two more names, taking the total to 1,806.

The Bengal Opposition, especially the BJP and the CPM, claimed the list was "incomplete" and that once the entire list of "tainted" teachers was published, it would reveal hundreds more such names, pushing the total of ineligible recruitments to no less than 6,000.

The Supreme Court, on April 3, scrapped the jobs of 25,753 teaching and non-teaching staff after finding that the entire 2016 selection process had been vitiated.

On August 28, the apex court specifically instructed the commission to publish the list of tainted candidates to prevent them from writing fresh selection tests scheduled for September 7 (secondary level) and September 14 (higher secondary level).

The Bengal BJP on Sunday activated its entire leadership to launch a sharp attack on the Mamata Banerjee government, claiming that by publishing the list of 1,806 "tainted" candidates, the state had admitted to the recruitment scandal involving teachers.

Leader of the Opposition Suvendu Adhikari on Sunday claimed that jobs were sold, with money routed to “Kalighat”, implying chief minister Mamata Banerjee, through agents such as arrested TMC MLA Jiban Krishna Saha while many party leaders appointed their relatives and family members as teachers at the expense of eligible candidates.

"Already, many names of relatives of Trinamool leaders have featured in the incomplete list of tainted teachers. Among them are Chopra’s Trinamool MLA Hamidul Rahaman’s daughter Roshnara Begum, former minister Paresh Adhikari’s daughter Ankita Adhikari, and TMC chief whip Nirmal Ghosh’s daughter-in-law Shampa Ghosh… countless such names are included," said Adhikari.

“Earlier, we used to say that Trinamool was a party of thieves. Now, by publishing the list, they have proved it. However, they were forced to admit the scandal only after the Supreme Court’s directive,” Adhikari added.

He further claimed that chief minister Mamata Banerjee herself was responsible for the tainted recruitment and that even a single illegal appointment was unlawful.

A BJP source said the party would escalate its political programmes and step up its attack on Mamata over corruption in the run-up to next year's Assembly elections.

Senior advocate and CPM Rajya Sabha member Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharyya directly accused the SSC of publishing an incomplete list, claiming that out of four categories of tainted candidates, the commission released names from only one category.

“The court specifically identified four categories of tainted appointees. According to our calculation, the total number would be over 6,000," he said.

“The SSC has published only those names detected by the CBI for OMR mismatch. But there are three more categories: appointments after the expiry of the panel, beyond the panel, and beyond recommendation,” said Bhattacharyya, who played an integral role in the legal battle against the 2016 recruitment scam.

“They have suppressed the tainted appointees of those three categories and published only a part of the list. We will certainly raise this issue before the court during the next hearing,” he added.

According to a commission official, the names were drawn from an affidavit submitted to the Supreme Court in mid-February. The affidavit, based on a CBI report, stated that 5,303 candidates were allegedly appointed illegally as teaching and non-teaching staff in government-aided schools. Of these, 1,806 were teachers.

“We have published the names of those identified as “tainted” teachers according to the Supreme Court verdict, and there is no question of suppression,” said an SSC official.

Trinamool leaders claimed that under Mamata’s regime, the truth was at least getting revealed because of digital records.

“An investigation is being conducted precisely because some wrongdoing has taken place. In fact, it is being exposed today only because the system has become computerised. During the CPM era, every wholetimer’s household had a government job. At that time, there was no digital system. So, there is no reason to think the CPM was beyond reproach,” said Trinamool’s Kunal Ghosh.