A day after the Calcutta High Court cancelled appointments of 25,753 teachers and non-teaching staff in West Bengal schools, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Tuesday said she does not look after everything and her government could have been given a chance to correct the “mistakes”.
Speaking at an election rally in Bhatar for party candidate, former cricketer Kirti Azad, Ms Banerjee assured those affected by the Calcutta High Court verdict to take the case to the Supreme Court for ‘justice’.
“I will not name any judge, but I am talking about the verdict. If you had pointed out the mistakes and directed us to correct them, we could have easily done that. Anybody can make a mistake, I do not look after everything. The education department is a separate one. There are different departments like the SSC, the primary board, and the College commission,” she added.
While delivering the verdict, the court said, “It is shocking that, at the level of the cabinet of the State Government, decision is taken to protect employment obtained fraudulently in a selection process conducted by SSC for state-funded schools, knowing fully well that, such appointments were obtained beyond the panel and after expiry of the panel,” the court said.
The bench had also directed that the CBI will hold further investigations with regard to the “persons involved, in the state government approving creation of supernumerary posts to accommodate illegal appointments” and custodial interrogation will be done if required.
Stating that India has the highest number of unemployed youths, Ms Banerjee came down heavily on the BJP government in the Centre, accusing them of using the judiciary to take away jobs from people.
Ms Banerjee also questioned who would take the responsibility if any one of those affected by the verdict “dies by suicide”.
“You (BJP) are asking for votes? How many people have you given employment? You had promised to employ 2 crore. Not a single person got any job,” the Trinamool chief said.
She described the order directing a section of the recruits to return all remunerations and benefits received by them with 12 per cent per annum interest, within four weeks, as “one-sided”.
“If there was anyone from your family, would you not be worried? If someone dies by suicide, will you take the responsibility? Do not be worried, I will fight the case as per our capability,” she said.
On the huge number of vacancies created by the cancellation of the appointments, the Trinamool chief also questioned who would be teaching the students in the schools.
“Will the BJP or the RSS people teach them?” she questioned.
Earlier addressing another rally in Hasan for the party’s Birbhum Lok Sabha candidate Satabdi Roy, the Bengal Chief Minister alleged that the BJP is trying to kill or imprison people who are speaking out against it.
Her reference was to Kolkata Police arresting a Mumbai resident, who had allegedly met 26/11 attack accused David Headley earlier, for purportedly conducting a recce of TMC national general secretary and her nephew Abhishek Banerjee’s residence and office in Kolkata.
The Trinamool wondered why the BJP was intimidating opposition leaders if it was confident of winning the polls.
“One BJP leader says he will explode a bomb. If you have any grudge against Mamata Banerjee, kill me. You were plotting to kill Abhishek Banerjee and we caught the person before he executed the plan,” she said.
Ms Banerjee’s reference was to a remark of the Leader of the Opposition in the assembly, Suvendu Adhikari, on Saturday that there would be a “big explosion” on Monday which would shake the Trinamool Congress and its top brass”. “The accused conducted a recce of Abhishek’s house and called him up, asking for an appointment. If he had given an appointment to the accused, that man could have killed him,” the Chief Minister said.
“They (BJP) want to kill or imprison people who speak out against them. They want to remove such people from this world,” she alleged.
The police arrested the Mumbai resident Rajaram Rege on Monday, a day after the Chief Minister alleged that the BJP was targeting her and her nephew and they did not feel safe. Both are covered by Z-plus security.
