“My science faculty is almost entirely gone. How will we run classes?” said Kakoli Chowdhury, headmistress of Sailaja Memorial Girls High School in Lalgola, Murshidabad, where the employment of 18 out of 46 teachers is to be cancelled after a Supreme Court order nullified 25,752 school jobs in West Bengal.
From holding classes and tests to checking answer scripts of Madhyamik (secondary board) examinations, hundreds of schools in West Bengal are facing a crisis after the order. Many state-run schools were already suffering from a dearth of teachers.
Notably, schools in West Bengal are yet to get an official notification in connection with the cancellations of recruitment, which came as the Supreme Court said the 2016 School Service Commission (SSC) recruitment process was “vitiated and tainted by fraud”.
Siddhartha Majumder, Chairman of Central School Service Commission of West Bengal, on Friday said, “We already got a letter from the state government regarding the Supreme Court order. We have started taking legal advice. We can say something only after making a decision. But the whole process cannot be completed within the three months.”
“We have 46 teachers out of a sanctioned strength of 60. Our school has 4,000 students. Now after the SC order, 18 teachers and a non-teaching staff will be gone. Most of the teachers teach biology, physics, chemistry and maths. Who will teach those subjects now?” said Chowdhury. “At present, the unit tests are on. How will we conduct the tests?” she said.
The thoughts were echoed by Jehangir Mian, a physics teacher at Lalgola M N Academy high school, where 11 teachers and one non-teaching staff will lose their jobs.
“Last year, we started AI and data science classes in our school. We had only one teacher for the subject. He lost his job. How will the students study? The students can’t even take tuitions since not a single teacher in that subject is available in the entire Lalgola block,” said Mian. The school has more than 4,000 students.
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“Many teachers who lost their jobs were in the process of scrutinising answer sheets of the Madhyamik examination. What will happen to that? The answer scripts they scrutinised, will they be valid? Who will check the answer scripts that are still left to be scrutinised? We do not know how to teach students and manage such affairs. Will we reduce periods and stop teaching some subjects for the time being? I had contacted the secondary and higher secondary board officials. They are also in the dark,” Mian claimed.
At Orahar Girls High School in Bhagabangola, Murshidabad, where there are around 2,000 students, eight of the 19 teachers have been ousted.
Najmun Nahar, the headmistress said, “Today, we have our first summative (unit test). I have requested the teachers to stay since the notification is yet to come. But after the notification what will happen? I am not sure how we will run the school.”
Though the Supreme Court has ordered fresh examinations through the West Bengal School Service Commission within three months, school administrations and teachers remain concerned about timely replacements.
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Sahin Saraf, headmaster of Sekhalipur high school in Lalgola, said the school will lose teachers for subjects like geography and physics.
“We lost nine teachers, six of whom teach science subjects. One must understand that not only for teaching, but teachers operate data and work for various government schemes like Kanyashree. Everything will be affected. Though the SC has ordered fresh examinations and a recruitment, whether it will happen on time and whether our school will get the requisite number of teachers is a question. It may take months.” This school has around 5,000 students.
In Arjunpur High School of the Farakka block of Murshidabad district, with 9,500 students, 36 of the 70 teachers will lose their jobs. “We haven’t recruited since 2018. It will be a very tough time to continue running the school,” said Faruk Abdullah, teacher and member of the School Organising committee.
Basudeb Santra, headmaster of Salimabad High school in Jamalpur, Bardhaman district, which has 1,200 students, said the school will no longer have science or history teachers. The school has also lost a clerk. Kalna Kashra high school in the same district lost science, philosophy, and history teachers and a clerk.