The School Service Commission (SSC) on Thursday announced that it would soon issue an advertisement for recruitment of assistant teachers in secondary and higher secondary schools.
Hours after the SSC notice, education minister Bratya Basu said the government had decided to create 5,261 additional teaching and non-teaching posts, which will be filled with candidates who had written recruitment tests conducted by the commission in 2016.
A number of such candidates are holding a sit-in off the Maidan alleging that they were not being given jobs despite being on the waiting list of the panel.
Chief minister Mamata Banerjee had on Tuesday called on the mobile phone of the deputy commissioner of police, south, and spoke to a leader of the protesters, requesting them to call off their agitation.
“We have created 5,261 posts. The exams were held in 2016. The posts have been created on humanitarian ground following instructions from the chief minister. We have recommended (for recruitment) from the panel of waitlisted candidates both for teaching and non-teaching staff,” said Basu.
The recruitment to the newly created posts of assistant teacher, which an official in the education department said are for Classes IX to XII, will be in addition to the recruitments to be made based on Thursday’s SSC notice.
The commission also announced during the day that it would soon issue an advertisement for appointment of headmasters and headmistresses.
The advertisement for the appointment of school heads is expected next month, council officials said.
Commission chairman Siddhartha Majumder said the advertisement for the appointment of assistant teachers would be issued before Durga Puja.
The test for the recruitment of school heads was last held in 2017, while that for the appointment of assistant teachers for Classes IX to XII was last held in November 2016.
There were 12,905 vacant posts of assistant teacher for Classes IX and X and 5,711 for Classes XI and XII in state-aided and state-sponsored schools when the test was held.
Although a section of the candidates who had written the examination has been recruited, some aspirants have moved court alleging irregularities in appointments.
An education department official said: “Many teachers have retired over the past six years. So vacancies have increased. Besides, aspiring teachers have alleged that the commission does not hold recruitment tests on a regular basis. So we are trying to make fresh recruitments at the earliest following all the procedures.”
About 25 per cent of the 9,192 secondary and higher secondary schools in Bengal do not have a headmaster or a headmistress. “That is resulting in further shortage of teaching staff as assistant teachers have to play the role of the teacher-in-charge in the schools that do not have a headmaster or a headmistress,” said an SSC official.
Education minister also announced on Thursday that the state government “has decided to create 750 additional posts for work education teachers and 850 additional posts for physical education teachers”.
The expanded panel, he said, will remain valid up to December 31, 2022.