Protesting schoolteachers in a sit-in outside Bikash Bhavan distanced themselves from the two school staff who were asked by Calcutta High Court to go to Bidhannagar (North) police station on Thursday to identify those who allegedly incited violence at the education secretariat on May 15.

On Thursday morning, as the two — Indrajit Mondal, a work education teacher, and Sudip Konar, a sacked Group D employee — went to the police station behind Bikash Bhavan, the teachers who are members of the Deserving Teachers’ Rights Forum continued with their sit-in.

They have been staging the protest outside Bikash Bhavan since May 7.

Chinmoy Mondal, a protesting teacher and a joint convener of the forum, said the two petitioners called for questioning were not part of their platform.

“They are not part of our platform. We have always maintained a safe distance from them. Earlier, we had cleared our stand during the protest in front of the school service commission’s (SSC) office last month. One of them (Indrajit Mondal) was not recruited from the 2016 panel,” Chinmoy told The Telegraph on Thursday, while Indrajit and Sudip were being interrogated.

The two had filed a petition at Calcutta High Court after their names cropped up among the 15 against whom the Bidhannagar police had drawn up an FIR on charges of taking part in the violence that unfolded at Bikash Bhavan on May 15.

A protesting teacher said the Supreme Court scrapped the jobs of teachers appointed based on the State Level Selection Test (SLST) conducted by the SSC in 2016.

“Indrajit Mondal was appointed in 2011 based on a recruitment test conducted by the SSC in 2010. He was not among those whose jobs were terminated by the Supreme Court on April 3,” he said.

“We have been identified as not specifically tainted by the Supreme Court in its April 17 modification of the April 3 order. We can go to school till December 31 and draw salaries,” he said.

“We sensed that these two, Indrajit and Sudip, were ideologically different from us. This is why we had distanced ourselves from them. However, we want everyone to come here irrespective of their political colour or agenda because the priority here is to save our jobs,” said Chinmoy.

Indrajit said he was a member of Sangrami Joutho Mancha, a platform fighting for raising the dearness allowance of state government employees, and had come to Bikash Bhavan on May 15 to show solidarity.

An official of the education department said that after Sudip and Indrajit filed a petition in the high court against the alleged police excesses on teaching and non-teaching staff at Bikash Bhavan last week, the members of the Deserving Teachers’ Rights Forum did not say anything about distancing themselves from the two.

“The moment the Forum saw the high court saying nothing on the alleged police excesses on Wednesday, and asked the two to name those who incited the May 15 violence, the Forum members disowned them. They are being opportunistic,” the official said.

This newspaper has seen Indrajit actively involved in the protest in front of Acharya Sadan, the SSC office, last month, and at Bikash Bhavan last week.