By A O News Service
ITANAGAR, Jan 06: “West Bengal education system is in pathetic condition and decreasing day by day as lakhs of teachers’ posts are lying vacant while ineligible people are getting jobs by paying bribe” – is the finding of Lawyers for Justice (LFJ), a high level fact finding committee of civil society members.
The LFJ was formed to visit West Bengal, meet victims of human rights violations by ruling Trinamool Congress Govt and its functionaries to ascertain facts and raise their voice. The committee met victims of many human rights violation cases during January 4 & 5 to ascertain facts and raise their voice during the visit, according to a release by LFJ.
The LFJ is deeply concerned for state’s future which once had given birth to the intellectual stalwarts of the nation. After a patience hearing, the panel feared that there will be loss of livelihood of an entire generation which will further have a cascading effect on the youths. Thus, the panel members decided to raise voice of aggrieved persons to deliver justice. The voice for justice for people of Bengal will now echo in the whole country.
The members were former Patna High Court Chief Justice and former Delhi CAT chairman, justice practicing senior advocate of Supreme Court of India and senior most judge of Andhra Pradesh High Court (retd.) L. Narsimha Reddy; former Haryana cadre IPS officer-cum-guest faculty of N.P.A. Hyderabad, Member of Academic Council of M.M. University, Ambala and Solan Rajpal Singh; leading women’s rights lawyer-cum-former member of core group for Women National Human Rights Commission Dr. Charu Wali Khanna; international resource person on law and human rights-cum- practicing SC lawyer Om Prakash Vyas; senior journalist Sanjeev Nayak; lawyer and NE India’s first representative of National Commission for Protection of Child Rights Rosy Taba.
In its first visit, the LFJ met hundreds of victims, including several doctors, of violation human rights and of different scams from different parts of the state, who enumerated their problems. Several youtubers and bloggers also explained as to how their fundamental rights were infringed and their accounts frozen. When they wanted to raise any issue, state machinery suppressed them indicating gross violation of fundamental right enshrined in the Constitution.
After meeting the aggrieved persons, it came to knowledge that there are several serious issues of teacher recruitment. More than 3.5 lakh teachers’ posts are still vacant. Some of the different issues of teachers are:
2014 TET exam scam: Several eligible candidates were deprived from getting jobs despite getting high marks.
Upper Primary (BUPCB) scam: There is zero appointment.
Speciale educators are still working as contractual despite favourable court order.
PTI: They have not been appointed despite recommendation.
After meeting aggrieved citizens and hearing their grievances, the committee members were deeply concerned.
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