In yet another blow to the West Bengal government, in particular the education department, a single-judge bench of the Calcutta High Court on Monday ordered a CBI inquiry into the recruitment of primary teachers by the West Bengal Board of Primary Education (WBBPE) in 2014.

The bench of Justice Avijit Gangopadhyay also ordered immediate cancellation of the appointment of 269 candidates for the post of primary teachers.

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While passing the order, Gangopadhyay observed that these 269 candidates secured jobs despite not qualifying in the written examination and some of them did not even appear for the same.

The single-judge bench directed WBBPE to immediately stop payment of salaries to these 269 candidates and also ensure that they are not able to enter the respective schools they were appointed henceforth.

WBBPE came out with a revised and second merit list in 2017 for the recruitment examination conducted in 2014. It was observed that in the revised merit list, these 269 candidates were awarded one additional mark each.

Although the WBBPE authorities explained that this additional one mark for each of these 269 candidates was awarded because of some error in the question paper, the explanation could not satisfy the court.

Justice Gangopadhyay said that by that logic why the additional one mark was awarded only to these 269 candidates, depriving the remaining 23 lakh candidates who appeared for the same examination. Hence the bench also rejected the revised and second merit list that WBBPE came out with in 2017.

Justice Gangopadhyay also directed WBBPE President Manik Bhattacharya and the board’s Secretary Ratna Chakraborty (Bagchi) to be present at the CBI’s Kolkata office by 5.30 PM on Monday with all the supporting documents and answer the questions of the central probe agency sleuths.

The CBI is already conducting a probe into the recruitment irregularities in various teaching and non-teaching posts by the West Bengal School Service Commission (WBSSC). The CBI sleuths have also questioned former Education Minister and Trinamool Congress secretary general Partha Chatterjee twice in this connection.