Affected non-teaching staff in Bengal whose jobs were cancelled after a Supreme Court order in April march to State Education Department headquarters in Salt Lake on Thursday June 5, 2025
| Photo Credit: The Hindu
The Calcutta High Court on Monday (June 9, 2025) sought an explanation from the West Bengal government on why non-teaching staff dismissed under an April 3 Supreme Court order should receive a monthly honorarium from the State while remaining at home, and reserved its decision in the matter.
“The assistance that you will be giving to these people, will these people give anything in return? Or they will sit at home and they will earn the money?” Justice Amrita Sinha asked the State’s counsel during the hearing of a writ petition challenging the provision of honorariums to the dismissed Group C and Group D staff.
The petition was filed by a waitlisted candidate who had not received appointments despite being on the merit list, alleging irregularities in the 2016 recruitment conducted by the West Bengal School Service Commission (WBSSC). The petition contests the State’s decision to provide financial assistance to the dismissed staff.
A total of 2,483 Group C and 4,550 Group D staffers lost their jobs after the Supreme Court, in its April 3 ruling, annulled close to 26,000 teaching and non-teaching appointments made by the WBSSC in 2016, describing the recruitment process as “vitiated and tainted”.
While the top court allowed the affected teachers to continue until December 31, 2025, and directed the State to begin a fresh recruitment process for teaching posts, no relief was granted to the dismissed non-teaching staff.
In response, the West Bengal government had announced in April that the sacked Group C and Group D employees would receive a monthly honorarium of ₹25,000 and ₹20,000 respectively, until a verdict was delivered on review petitions filed by the State and the SSC.
During Monday’s (June 9, 2025) hearing, Justice Sinha asked the State not to disburse the amount until further orders. “That means someone will stay at home and you will go on paying the money till the Supreme Court decides on the issue? And how long will the issue be set to be pending in the Supreme Court? … You are spending public money for it,” she observed.
The Court also inquired whether a comparable scheme had been considered for the waitlisted candidates who did not obtain appointments owing to the irregular recruitment process.
Defending the honorarium scheme, the State’s counsel argued that it was introduced in light of the “sudden loss of livelihood” faced by the affected individuals.
Meanwhile, the dismissed non-teaching staff reiterated their demand for reinstatement and a distinction between “tainted” and “untainted” candidates. “We never asked the State government to provide allowance or jobs for the tainted and non-deserving candidates. We also did not ask for any allowance. We (non-tainted) Group C and D staff only asked for our jobs to be restored with dignity and the list of tainted and non-tainted staff to be published, like they did for teachers,” Amit Mondal, a dismissed Group C employee from Dum Dum Bapuji Colony Adarsha Buniadi Vidya Mandir, said.
“So, today’s judgment was meant to happen, given that the State was willing to give the honorarium to all of the sacked non-teaching staff as a blanket move,” Mr. Mondal told The Hindu.
Published – June 09, 2025 09:09 pm IST
