Calcutta HC Removes President Of State Board Of Primary Education, Says Can't Tolerate Such An Unscrupulous Person

The Calcutta High Court has removed Manik Bhattacharya from the post of President of the West Bengal Board of Primary Education. 

The Bench of Justice Abhijit Gangopadhyay found that Bhattacharya as the President of the Board is responsible for producing misleading statements, committed conspicuous illegality and mislead the Court about the existence of an expert committee, while dealing with a matter relating to the alleged illegal appointment of primary teachers in government aided schools.

Advocate Sudipta Dasgupta appeared for the Petitioner in the writ petition, while Senior Advocate L.K. Gupta appeared for the Board, Advocate Arka Kumar Nag for the state and ASG Billwadal Bhattacharyya for the CBI. 

"Such a person cannot remain the President of a statutory authority. He is wholly unfit for the post of President of the Board", the Bench said in its order.

"Therefore, this court removes Mr. Manik Bhattacharya from the post of President of the West Bengal Board of Primary Education forthwith", the Court directed, adding that "..I direct the Government to appoint any other fit person as President of the Board and till the new President is appointed, the Secretary of the Board namely, Ratna Chakraborty Bagchi will perform the function of the President of the Board".

The Court also said in its order that "This Court shall not tolerate such an unscrupulous person as President of West Bengal Board of Primary Education".

The Court has also directed Manik Bhattacharya to appear before the court personally today "for facing some questions from this court".

The Court found that the President of the Board is responsible for misleading the Court and making a dishonest attempt in producing documents which were not original and some which are highly questionable, as per the Court. The Court found that it was lied to in respect of the expert committee of the School Education Department, to whom it was sent to ascertain whether the question/answer key provided in TET 2014 in respect of one question was correct or not, as no such committee was constituted at all, as per Court. 

The Court also found that there was no approval of the government in respect of awarding one mark to some candidate and a false statement was made by the President of the Board about this.

Click here to read/download Order