Kolkata, May 16: A day after a series of violent clashes broke out between agitating school teachers and police in and around the headquarters of the West Bengal Education Department in Salt Lake, protesters continued their demonstration outside the government complex on Friday.
The teachers, who lost their jobs following a recent Supreme Court order that cancelled thousands of appointments in government-aided schools due to irregularities in the recruitment process, assembled near the Bikash Bhavan compound and raised slogans against the West Bengal government.
They did not show any intention to barge into the state education department headquarters by breaking the lock of the main gate because of the presence of a heavy police deployment.
Many of those who suffered minor injuries in the clashes on Thursday returned to the site and joined the demonstration, said a member of the Deserving Teachers’ Rights Forum.
The number of protesters, including colleagues of jobless teachers and their friends from other professions, swelled to over a thousand from around 200 in the morning.
Chinmoy Mondal, one of the spokespersons of the forum, said thousands of civil rights activists and political workers without party colours are expected to gather outside Bikash Bhavan on Friday evening to express solidarity with the movement of teachers, and a future roadmap of the protest would be announced.
Of around 100 protesters injured in police action on Thursday, at least 60-70 had to be hospitalised and are undergoing treatment, he said.
The ‘eligible’ teachers have been demanding immediate steps for the permanent reinstatement of their jobs, and that they should not be asked to appear for a fresh recruitment test after cracking the 2016 School Service Commission (SSC) exams.
Over 200 protesting teachers continued the sit-in outside the Bikash Bhavan throughout the night, one of the agitators said.
The area around Bikash Bhavan turned into a virtual battlefield on Thursday evening after a series of violent clashes broke out between the protesting school teachers and the police.
Many teachers, including several women, were injured in a police baton-charge, which persisted for over an hour, eyewitnesses said.
Despite repeated pleas to the teachers to allow stranded employees of the education department to return home, the protesters continued their agitation on Thursday evening, Deputy Commissioner of Police (Bidhannagar) Anish Sarkar said.
The protesters – belonging to the Deserving Teachers’ Rights Forum – claimed that they had agreed to allow women and ailing employees of ‘Bikash Bhavan’ to leave the place on production of an identity card, but suddenly police personnel started the baton-charge.
Mondal, one of the spokespersons of the forum, told PTI, “It was a ploy by the police. We had no intention to block the passage of women and ailing employees. We agreed to allow some of the stranded employees to leave the place in late evening hours and moved to a side of the compound, but the police personnel suddenly started beating us mercilessly by closing the main gate.”
The total number of injured teachers was around 100, one of the protesters, Mehboob Mondal, said.
The Supreme Court had invalidated the appointment of 25,753 teachers and other staff in state-aided schools and termed the entire selection process “vitiated and tainted”.
In a subsequent order, the apex court said those found to be ‘untainted’ can continue their duties in their workplace till December 31 and draw salaries.
The West Bengal School Service Commission (WBSSC) sent names of over 15,000 ‘untainted’ teachers to DI offices who can continue till the end of this year, and found over 1,300 as tainted.
The protesting teachers claimed that their names had been sent to the DI offices, and they have been getting salaries, but they demanded an end to the uncertainty.
They also alleged that the WBSSC has not taken the views of the lawyers representing their case in the Supreme Court, while filing the review petition of the SC order on May 3.(PTI)
