Hundreds of candidates, who claimed to have cleared Teacher Eligibility Test (TET) in 2014, staged a ‘dharna’ on Monday outside the office of the West Bengal Board of Primary Education in Salt Lake, demanding that they be given immediate job appointment letters. Incidentally, few job seekers sitting on dharna since years at the Maidan, received the appointment letter after the intevention of Justice Abhijit Ganguly of Calcutta High Court who reprimanded the Mamata Banerjee government by saying, “I cannot imagine such corruption in life..”

The candidates who have cleared their exams are still waiting for the job appointment, many among them have lost their parents in the due course of time but still nothing has happened. The agitators said that they had appeared for two interviews after qualifying the written TET 2014 examination, but did not get jobs vide its panel, which, according to the board, has expired. The candidates made it clear that they would not want to appear for a fresh examination as announced by the government for this year, the candidates demanded that they be appointed as teachers in West Bengal government-sponsored and -aided schools as per the previous merit list.

The protesters on Monday afternoon had sat on a dharna and blocked the road at the busy Karunamoyee crossing initially, but later on shifted to the primary education board office, situated near the by. Mamata Banerjee’s police had tried its best to disperse the protesters by miking all thorough the evening but the agitators turned a deaf ear. “We are on a peaceful agitation and our protest is peaceful. We are not disturbing anybody or causing harassment to anyone, then why should we move”, said a protesters. They all accused the state government for doing nothing to help the incumbents to get a job. All of them have been requesting the state government past few years. They demand an answer from the Chief Minister why they should not be given a job having already cleared all rounds in 2014.

The education in West Bengal has collapsed. The people in the state have become more skeptical after the recent action by Enforcement Directorate (ED) cracking the education scam in the state. The arrest of former Education Minister Partha Chatterjee and recently former West Bengal Board of primary education chairman Manik Bhattacharya have irked the people who had been demanding a reply for not getting job since 2014. Bhattacharya was removed from the post of chairman on an order of the Calcutta High Court, before which a number of petitions have been moved alleging graft in the appointment process of teachers in state-sponsored and -aided schools.