KOLKATA: CBI on Saturday lodged an FIR against five persons and “unknown other” officers of the West Bengal School Service Commission in the course of its investigation into “massive irregularities” in state school appointments. The move came a day after an FIR was filed against minister of state for education Paresh Adhikary.
The agency slapped charges of forgery and cheating on SSC’s former adviser Santi Prasad Sinha, former chairman Soumitra Sarkar, ex-secretary Asoke Kumar Saha and programme officer Samarjit Acharya. CBI also named former West Bengal Board of Secondary Education president Kalyanmoy Ganguly in the FIR.
A separate probe was initiated into alleged irregularities in Group C appointments of state-aided schools.
Some of the names mentioned in the FIR suggested that CBI laid its focus on the five- member panel set up with the approval of former education minister Partha Chatterjee, to oversee recruitments of Group C and Group D posts after the expiry of the State Level Selection Test panel.
The agency had with it the report of the inquiry committee led by retired high court judge Ranjit Kumar Bag. The report said as many as 222 candidates of the total 381, appointed as teachers after the expiry of the SSC panel on May 18, 2019, didn’t qualify in the written test.
