Page 26 - EW November 2023

Education News

tration and so on both for school and on December 4, 2016,
higher education.” NEAT will serve while TET for up-
as a permanent workshop to iron out per primary teachers
inevitable glitches in the APAAR- was last held in 2015.
ABC programme. This bridging of With the teacher re-
the academy-industry divide which cruitment process
has existed for decades, is undoubt- for upper primary,
edly a welcome development. secondary and higher
Autar Nehru (Delhi) secondary stalled by
court stay orders fol-
WEST BENGAL lowing allegations of
Massive teacher recruitment scams
alleging violation of
recruitment drive NCTE rules, manipu-
lation of marks, non-
publication of merit
year after the multi-crore lists post interview,
teacher recruitment scam for Bengal teachers agitating for appointment letters preference given to
AWest Bengal’s 92,748 govern- untrained candidates,
ment schools came to light following 17 hearing by the division bench of and awarding out-of-turn appoint-
the arrests of Partha Chatterjee, for- the Calcutta high court, WBSSC will ments for illegal consideration, there’s
mer education minister, Kalyanmoy start recruiting teachers for upper a massive teacher shortage in govern-
Ganguly, former president of West primary schools between November 6 ment and aided schools statewide. Ac-
Bengal Board of Secondary Education and December 2. The recruitment for cording to a report published by the
(WBBSE) and several other govern- 14,339 teachers will be from the panel state education department, 7,018
ment and ruling party bigwigs by the of 9,000 selected together with 4,334 primary schools have been shut down
Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) wait listed candidates who qualified in statewide due to teacher shortage.
and the Enforcement Directorate the upper primary TET held way back According to political pundits in
(ED), the Mamata Banerjee-led Tri- in 2015. The first list of selected can- Kolkata, sensing that teacher recruit-
namool Congress (TMC) government didates was cancelled by Calcutta high ment scams could well prove to be
has announced a slew of teacher re- court in 2017. the Achilles heel of the TMC in the
cruitment initiatives. Primary, upper Simultaneously, recruitment of general elections scheduled for April-
primary, secondary as well as higher principals and headmasters for gov- May 2024, chief minister Banerjee
secondary school teachers are being ernment and aided schools, stalled has started pulling out all the stops to
urgently recruited. since 2017 following allegations of place public education high on her to-
According to notices published by malpractices, will also start this month do list. She has rolled out a schema to
the state government in September (November). Currently 3,000 posts transfer Rs.10,000 to bank accounts of
and October, the West Bengal School of principals and headmasters are va- 9.5 lakh class XII students in 14,000
Service Commission (WBSSC) will cant. Additionally, according to an Oc- government schools and 636 madra-
conduct a Teacher Eligibility Test tober 21 notice by WBSSC, the board sas for buying smartphones or tab-
(TET) for nearly 74,000 primary is expected to notify the State Level lets, distributed 2.5 million bicycles
schools on December 10, for which Selection Test (SLST) for recruiting to classes IX-XII students in Decem-
online applications were completed teachers for 20,000 secondary and ber 2021 and supplied dry rations and
on October 8. Last December, TET for higher secondary schools. Decks have textbooks to 99.7 percent of school
primary teachers was held after a gap reportedly also been cleared to recruit students during the pandemic. She
of five years amid tight security ar- guest teachers on contractual basis for has also introduced 100 days bridge
rangements to fill 11,000 vacancies in public schools to address the acute courses for students of all classes to
state government and aided schools. shortage of educators (estimated 30 make up for lost learning during the
At that time 6.19 lakh candidates percent, including 3,132 mathemat- pandemic.
wrote the primary TET, of which 1.50 ics and 1,795 physics teachers). Monitors of West Bengal’s unruly
lakh candidates, including 69,408 fe- This flurry of recruitment activ- political scene believe that Banerjee’s
male and 81,077 males qualified. The ity has been welcomed by parents, massive teacher recruitment drive in
interview process of empanelled can- children and the community. The the final stretch before General Elec-
didates has already been completed. last SLST for classes IX-X was held tion 2024 is likely to strike a respon-
Moreover, following an October in November 2016; for classes XI-XII sive chord in the state’s influential

26 EDUCATIONWORLD NOVEMBER 2023