Kolkata, June 28 A fresh controversy erupted on Tuesday over the West Bengal School Service Commission (WBSSC) recruitment scam after Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee held the petitioners, in particular their counsel, responsible for putting the teachers recruitment process in the state on hold.
The Chief Minister targeted CPI(M) Rajya Sabha member Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharya, who was the counsel for a number of petitioners on this count. She said the petitioners should either withdraw the cases or get a verdict in their favour so that the recruitment process can start again and the petitioners can also be accommodated.
"After some irregularities were detected, I arranged for fresh recruitments for 17,000 teachers, under which those deprived could have been accommodated. But that process has stopped following the court order. In addition, many have lost their jobs because of the court order. Now I will follow the court order," Banerjee said at a Trinamool rally in Asansol on Tuesday.
She then attacked Bhattacharya, a reputed lawyer, and told the petitioners to approach the latter for arranging their jobs.
"Because of the court cases filed by Bhattacharya, the recruitment process has stopped. He has enough money. So go and tell him to arrange something so that the recruitment process can resume again," Banerjee said.
She also appealed to the petitioners either to withdraw their cases or get a verdict in their favour.
Bhattacharya, on his part, did not delay in replying to the salvos from the Chief Minister.
Throwing a challenge towards Banerjee, he said that he will arrange jobs for 17,000 people in two hours on the sole condition that the Chief Minister should resign from her post.
"She should understand that I was just a counsel and I did not file the petitions. These petitions were filed since there were massive irregularities where ineligible people were recruited against financial considerations. The petitions were filed because of these irregularities. The Chief Minister is now trying to mislead the people by holding the petitioners responsible," Bhattacharya said.
While the Chief Minister was addressing the rally in Asansol, she spotted some deprived job-seekers with placards. Spotting them, she said that it would be useless to approach her for job since the matter was pending in the court.
Disclaimer: This post has been auto-published from an agency feed without any modifications to the text and has not been reviewed by an editor