Several Division Benches of the Calcutta High Court on Monday recused themselves from hearing a petition related to the alleged scam in recruitment by the School Service Commission (SSC) in West Bengal. Earlier in the day a Division Bench of Justice Harish Tandon and Justice Rabindranath Samanta recused itself from hearing a batch of petitions relating to alleged irregularities in SSC recruitment of Group D staff in State-run schools.
The development comes after a single Judge Bench of Justice Abhijit Gangopadhyay had raised objections about the orders of a Division Bench, which had stayed his direction for a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into the alleged recruitment scam. Last week Justice Gangopadhyay had written to the Chief Justice of India and Chief Justice of Calcutta High Court expressing disapproval that his orders for a CBI probe were stayed.
In another order relating to the case, Justice Gangopadhyay on Monday expressed strong objections after four committee members of the five-member committee, constituted by the School Education Department of Government in connection with the alleged scam, did not appear before the CBI. The chairperson of the Committee had appeared before agency on instructions of the Court last week.
“I do not believe that the said four persons do not have a copy of the court’s order dated 01.04.2022 passed in WPA 18585 of 2021…. The CBI has intimated through their report that they issued notice through Whatsapp requesting them to attend the CBI’s office and the order passed by this 3 court dated 01.04.2022 was sent at the same time in pdf form,” the order by Justice Gangopadhyay said.
Meanwhile, the four members of the committee — Saptansu Basu, Ranjan Bachawat, Biswajit Kumar and Subhankar Nag — approached a bench of Chief Justice Prakash Shrivastava seeking that their plea seeking relief from appearing before the CBI be heard by another bench. The plea comes after the Chief Justice had referred the matter to two Division Benches of the Court who, however, recused themselves from hearing the matter.
Getting no respite from the Calcutta High Court in the day, the four committee members appeared before the CBI later in the day. The division bench of Justice Joymalya Bagchi is scheduled to hear their petition.
