Kolkata, 4 December (H.S.) : Just a day after the West Bengal government received relief in the primary teachers’ recruitment case, the Calcutta High Court delivered a major setback. On Thursday, a single bench of Justice Biswajit Basu struck down all supernumerary (additional) posts created for upper primary appointments.

The court ruled that supernumerary posts cannot be created in the same manner as regular recruitment posts and may only be established under exceptional circumstances. Justice Basu observed that “constitutional morality can never be subordinate to political morality.”

The state government had created 1600 additional posts in 2022 to recruit candidates from the waiting list — 750 for Work Education and 850 for Physical Education — through two government notifications issued in May and October 2022.

The High Court cancelled both notifications, stating that creating new posts after the expiry of a selection panel is legally impermissible, and appointments from an expired waiting list cannot be made under any circumstances.

Other issues related to upper primary recruitment will be heard in January.

The judgment is considered a significant blow to the state government, which had received relief just 24 hours earlier, when a division bench upheld the appointments of 32,000 primary teachers, reversing a previous cancellation order.

Hindusthan Samachar / Satya Prakash Singh