West Bengal school jobs row: SC to hear pleas challenging Calcutta HC verdict on September 24

Supreme Court to hear West Bengal teacher appointment case on September 24, following Calcutta High Court order.

The Supreme Court on Tuesday (September 10, 2024) said it would hear on September 24 the pleas of the West Bengal government and others challenging a Calcutta High Court order that invalidated the appointment of 25,753 teachers and non-teaching staff in state government and aided schools.

A bench comprising Chief Justice D.Y. Chandrachud and Justices J.B. Pardiwala and Manoj Misra said it may not be able to hear the batch of pleas, listed on Tuesday (September 10, 2024), due to the hearing of some other matters during the day.

“We will list it on September 24,” the CJI said.

Earlier, the top court had said that it will hear the pleas on September 10 and granted last opportunity to the parties to file their responses to the petitions by August 16.

The bench had also asked the nodal counsel – Astha Sharma, who represents the state government, and Shalini Kaul, Partha Chatterjee and Shekhar Kumar – to prepare a common compilation of the records in electronic form and ensure that the judgments cited by the parties were part of one set of the PDF documents.

The top court has been hearing 33 petitions on the high court’s April 22 judgment on the matter.

The pleas challenging the order also include the one filed by the West Bengal government.