The Bengal school service commission has contended in its review petition before the Supreme Court that when it was possible to segregate the tainted candidates, it was not clear why the court ordered the cancellation of the entire selection process.

The review petition says, “the commission’s consistent stand before the High Court and before this court is that the segregation of tainted from untainted in respect of the entire selection lot is possible”.

The SSC has attached a chart in the petition detailing how the tainted can be segregated from the untainted.

The SSC has said the apex court’s April 17 order that teachers “not specifically found to be tainted” could go to school till December 31 was “premised” in a way that suggested segregation was possible.

In such a scenario, cancelling the whole panel amounted to “miscarriage of justice” and needs to be reviewed, the petition says.

This newspaper has gone through the text of the review petition.

In it, the SSC has said the en masse termination of teaching and non-teaching jobs has landed the school education system in trouble and handed an advantage to “private unaided schools leading to exploitation”.

The petition says: “The order passed on 17.04.2025... is premised in a way which itself segregates tainted and untainted... but still the entire selection came to be cancelled.”

After the April 17 order, which the Supreme Court passed following a petition by the state secondary education board, the commission identified 15,403 teachers at the secondary and higher secondary level as “not specifically tainted” and allowed them to return to school till December 31 and draw salaries.

The commission identified 1,804 teachers as tainted and barred them from returning to school.

“The apex court must take cognisance of the fact that the SSC could segregate the candidates based on the evidence it has. Therefore, the decision to cancel the whole panel must be reconsidered while adjudicating on the review petition,” said an official of the education department.

The petition was filed in the Supreme Court on May 3. It is likely to be heard on Thursday.

The petition says the Supreme Court “incorrectly concluded that there were systematic irregularities” without a finding on whether the data recovered by the CBI was reliable. “Without a finding regarding the reliability of the data, this court incorrectly concluded that there were systematic irregularities or widespread manipulations and thus cancelled the entire selection process.”

It says, “Further, systematic fraud has not been judicially established. The CBI investigation is ongoing and merely chargesheets came to be filed and no convictions have been recorded. The court’s finding of widespread fraud is based on unproven allegations, contrary to the principle of presumption of innocence.”

The SSC has challenged the Supreme Court’s April 3 order in which the court said appointing school staff after the “expiry of the panel” was one of the tools of illegality.

“It is submitted that there was a good reason to justify the extension of the term of the panel and merely because appointments were made after the expiry of the date of the panel, such appointments cannot be said to be illegal and contrary to rules.”

SSC chairperson Siddhartha Majumdar declined to comment.