KOLKATA: Calcutta High Court has ordered the governing body of a Kolkata college to reconsider its decision refusing appointment to an applicant to a professor's post on the grounds that he was an amputee. The court said the decision was "regressive" and went against principles of "empowering" persons with disabilities.
Arun Sarkar, who had previously taught at the Kandi Raj College in Murshidabad for seven years from April 2010, had lost both arms in a train accident. The Naihati resident, who is 80% disabled, had applied for the new position as he was finding it difficult to commute to the Murshidabad college, around 480km away. The College Service Commission had recommended his appointment at Acharya Girish Chandra Bose College (formerly Bangabasi College of Commerce) in central Kolkata as an assistant professor in Bengali.
