Chaos In Bengal

Political conditions in West Bengal (a state of India; where I live) are very bad right now.

Corruption is at its peak, the economy is about to collapse within a month or so. The ex-Education Minister of the state is in jail for a huge scandal of School Teacher recruitment.

In India, we have two eligibility tests for getting a job as a teacher in government schools. TET/CTET, Teachers Eligibility Test for Primary (Pre-primary to class 4/5) and Upper Primary (Class 5/6 to 8) level; and SSC Tests for High Schools (class 9 to 12). To appear in TET you must have done a two-year course for Diploma in Elementary Education or Bachelor’s in Elementary Education. For SSC you need Bachelors of Education degree.

States of India have their own TET and SSC exams for State-controlled Government Schools. Whereas the Central government has CTET and SSC Tests.

CTET and Central Government SSC tests are conducted every year as it’s supposed to be. But West Bengal government hasn’t conducted TET since 2017 and the SSC test since 2016. But the more interesting thing is most 2014 and 2017 TET passed examinees haven’t been appointed, instead the vacancies were given to candidates who didn’t pass or maybe they passed but were not in the Merit List rankings, because the bribed government officials such as Then Education Minister and other chairpersons of the Exam Conducting Board.

As per the reports, the jobs were sold for about ₹15-16 Lakhs.

In 2017, on average $1 was equivalent to ₹65.0966. In Numbers 1 Lakh is 1,00,000. That means ₹1 Lakh Rupees was about (100000 ÷ 65.0966) = $1536.18. Therefore 16 Lakh Rupees is equivalent to $23042.68

As you can see, the amount is huge. So people who got the jobs were mostly rich or at least in good financial condition.

Now in 2022, things took an interesting turn. ED raided Ex-Education Minister and his media-titled “Girlfriend’s” House and Boom 💥, Cash… Huge amounts of Cash. When the pictures of the cash were released to the public, there was chaos everywhere. I have never seen such amount of 💸 cash in a single frame. I am sure the officers were also shocked to see that much cash.

The whole scandal was exposed. High-profile culprits were put in jail and a few names of those unqualified candidates were also exposed. The High Court ordered those people who got the job by bribing to return all the salary they got all these years, and they were also fired. The court ordered the State Government to appoint the candidates who were supposed to get the job according to the real Merit List. More cash was seized in the following weeks.

Under pressure from the High Court and opposition parties as well as the general public, the State Government announced they are gonna conduct another TET examination this year on December 11. They also said that 2014 and 2017 TET passed candidates will also be eligible for direct interviews for jobs. But here’s another twist… We have an upper age limit to be eligible for TET, but some of the candidates of 2014 and 2017 candidates are now older than the upper age limit, now as expected we got another Court Case. Opposition is saying that the government did this intentionally so that a court case will be filed and the government will be able to postpone the recruitment.

I don’t know what will happen next, but I have applied for TET as my Diploma in Elementary course has officially been finished the only thing left is the final exams; and as per the rules anyone who is currently doing the course and has passed the first year exams, is eligible for TET exams. Things are pretty messed up right now, nobody is sure what will happen next.