Shillong, July 4, 2020: As many as 506 lower primary school teachers in Meghalaya have lost their jobs because of an education scam that hit the northeastern Indian state 11 years ago.
The Central Bureau of Investigation has already charge sheeted former Education Minister Ampareen Lyngdoh and retired government officials, J D Sangma and AI Lyngdoh for manipulating score sheets of candidates, who had appeared for teacher selection tests.
The first CBI report had revealed irregularities in the recruitment in five centers, the government had terminated the service of 246 teachers. Following the second report of the CBI that examined the remaining ten centers, the Education department on June 29 terminated the service of another batch of 260 teachers.
The CBI had segregated both tainted and non-tainted teachers who were appointed allegedly through unfair means.
F C Shullai, general secretary All Primary School Teachers’ Association, said that the association is going through the termination letters. “We will appeal against the decision of government but we have not decided whether the appeal should be made in High Court or Supreme Court. We are examining how the government suddenly terminated the services of teachers without giving any notice,” Shullai said.
Though the CBI had probed 10 centers where recruitment took place, the investigating agency examined documents of eight centres as papers related to two others were missing.
After the CBI submitted the report to the High Court of Meghalaya, the government had constituted a high level panel as per the direction of the court. The court in its order on July 5, 2019, had asked the panel to further examine the education scam case and dispose of the matter within six months.
The committee headed by Additional Chief Secretary, Rebecca Suchiang had submitted the report to the education department which finally decided to terminate the services of 260 tainted teachers.
The court had ordered that “if large scale manipulations or interference of public representative or any other person are found, the committee may recommend scrapping of the whole selection process of the concerned centers.
The case to light after one ‘courageous candidate’ filed the initial Right to Information application. This revealed that Education Minister Lyngdoh, instructed her officer J. D. Sangma to doctor the selection list, based on the recommendations from the politicians.
The “candidate” then approached activist Agnes Kharshiin, who filed a First Information Report, based on the information received. When the government tried to scuttle the case Kharshiin and her friend Angela Rangad decided to disclose the names in another FIR. This forced the government to examine the question of culpability of the politicians and bureaucrats.
Sangma and Lyngdoh’s supporters wantonly white inked successful candidates and marks and created a ‘tainted’ merit list. It took eight years of long and convoluted struggle, from the lowest to highest court, inside and outside the court system, before the division bench of Meghalaya High Court delivered its bombshell judgment on November 2, 2017.
The high court handed over the investigation to the CBI and directed it to submit its report within six months to bring to book the persons responsible for the scam.
The CBI report had pointed out that the majority of candidates were appointed in an irregular manner by changing their original marks on account of experience, education, qualification in the score-sheets by applying a white fluid (correction ink).
Source: theshillongtimes.com