Calcutta High Court (Appellete Side)
(Rabin Tudu vs State Of West Bengal & Ors.) on 18 May, 2023
Author: Harish Tandon
Bench: Harish Tandon
18.05.2023 (Assigned) WPA/13628/2018 Court : 04 with Item : 11-79 WPO/41/2020 Ab with WPO/306/2020 (RABIN TUDU Vs. STATE OF WEST BENGAL & ORS.) with MAT/378/2021 (SUPRIYA RAY VS. STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with MAT/379/2021 (RATANLAL HALDER VS. STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with MAT/380/2021 (JYOTIRMAY JANA VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) With WPA/10262/2023 (MITHUN SADHUKHAN VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10271/2023 (SANCHITA BHOWMICK VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10301/2023 (SOUMI MONDAL VS THE STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10367/2023 (SANDIPA SINGHA ROY VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10396/2023 (KABITA MURMU VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10399/2023 (PRAKASSINDHU PRADHAN VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10402/2023 (RAJASREE CHAKRABORTY VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10407/2023 (SHISUTOSH KARAK VS THE STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10428/2023 (SUPRABHAT DAS VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10505/2023 |(ADITI PUROHIT VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10543/2023 (SUVENDU PANDA VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10664/2023 (ARCHITA DEY VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.
with WPA/10790/2023 (SAKUNTALA CHAKRABORTI GANGULY VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10810/2023 (PRAJNAMITA NATH VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10858/2023 (MAUMITA ROY VS THE STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10874/2023 (SUNANDA MOHANTA VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10879/2023 (ATASHI PATRA VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10887/2023 2 (APARAJIT BANERJEE VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10892/2023 (SMITA BHATTACHARYA VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10941/2023 (PINAKI MANDAL VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10945/2023 (SANJOY MONDAL VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10965/2023 (SANGITA BANERJEE VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with X WPA/10970/2023 (SUDESHNA DAS BISWAS VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10974/2023 (MEGHNAD ROY VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with X WPA/10979/2023 (PINKY BISWAS VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10981/2023 (INDRANI GUHA VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10985/2023 (PALLABI CHATTERJEE VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10986/2023 (MITA GUHA THAKUR VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10988/2023 (SUTAPA MANDAL VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10989/2023 (SUCHARITA CHAKRABARTY VS THE STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10990/2023 (KASTURI BASAK VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10992/2023 (TANUSREE GHOSH VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10996/2023 (MARUFA KHATUN VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/10999/2023 (BARNALI BHAKTA VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/11002/2023 (GARGI CHAKRABORTY VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/11009/2023 (NIKHILESH DINDA VS THE STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/11150/2023 (KAUSHIK SEN VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with (ESHITA KUNDU VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/11156/2023 (MOUMITA DUTTA DEY VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/11171/2023 (PIYALI MUKHERJEE VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/11175/2023 (MADHUSHREE DATTA VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) 3 with WPA/11180/2023 (HAIMANTI GANGULY VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/11183/2023 (SREYASI ROY VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/11189/2023 (DURBA BANDYOPADHYAY VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/11195/2023 (SUDESHNA LAHIRI CHAKRABORTI VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/11198/2023 (SOUMITA MONDAL VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/11215/2023 (PRIYANKA JANA VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/11293/2023 (ANUSUA SHAOO VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/11300/2023 (RUPALI SENGUPTA VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/11302/2023 (CHINMAY RAY VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/11304/2023 (SHAMPA DAS VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/11308/2023 (NANDADULAL JANA VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/11311/2023 (TULSIDAS KABIRAJ VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/11314/2023 (TAPAS KUMAR MANDAL VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/11319/2023 (PAULOMI MAITY VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/15707/2021 (SUJATA MUKHOPADHYAY VS THE STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/17476/2021 (KRISHNA BERA (BAIDYA) VS THE STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with IA NO: CAN/1/2021 & IA NO: CAN/1/2021 with WPA/23626/2018 (KAMALA KANTA HANSDA VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL & ORS.) with IA NO: CAN/1/2018(Old No:CAN/5851/2018) & IA NO: CAN/1/2018(Old No:CAN/5851/2018) with WPA/23628/2018 (SANDIP MANDAL VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL & ORS.) with WPA/3181/2020 (JAGANNATH SARDAR VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL & ORS.) with WPA/5515/2020 (DEBABRATA KANJI VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL & ORS.) with WPA/5518/2020 (SHRABANTI DEBNATH VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL) with WPA/5519/2020 4 (ANASUYA BODHAK VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL & ORS.) with WPA/5522/2020 (SUPRIYA MUKHOPADHYAY VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/11155/2023 (LIPIKA BISWAS VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) with WPA/11283/2023 (BAISHAKHIPARNA BANERJEE VS STATE OF WEST BENGAL AND ORS.) Mr. Subir Sanyal, Advocate Mr . Ekramul Bari, Advocate Mr. S.M. Ali, Advocate Mr. Anindya Bose, Advocate Mr. Diptendu Mondal, Advocate Mr. Subhrangsu Panda, Advocate Ms. Iva Bhattacharya, Advocate Ms. Mithu Singha Mahapatra, Advocate Mr. Sudip Ghosh Chowdhury, Advocate Ms. Bina Baidya, Advocate Mr. Abhishek Bose, Advocate Mr. Biswarup Biswas, Advocate Mr. Gora Chand Samanta, Advocate Mr. Nirmalendu Bera, Advocate Mr. Sakti Pada Jana, Advocate Mr. Subhajyoti Das, Advocate Mr. Partha Sarkar, Advocate Mr. Abhijit Basu, Advocate Mr. Ujjal Ray, Advocate Mr. Arpa Chakraborty, Advocate Mr. Sk. Abdur Rahim, Advocate ......for the Petitioners Mr. S.N. Mookerjee, Learned Advocate General Mr. Anirban Ray, Learned Government Pleader Mr. Tapan Kumar Mukherjee, Learned AGP Mr. Sirsanya Bandopadhyay, Ld. Junior Standing Counsel Mr. Bhsakar Prasad Vaisya, Learned AGP Mr. Swapan Kumar Datta, Learned AGP Mr. Biswabrata Basu Mullick, Advocate Mr. Malay Singh, Advocate Mr. Dipankar Das Gupta, Advocate Mr. Arindam Chattopadhyay, Advocate Mr. Suman Dey, Advocate Mr. Mrinal Kanti Ghosh, Advocate Mr. Ranjan Saha, Advocate Mr. Sagnik Chatterjee, Advocate Mr. Supriyo Chattopadhyay, Advocate Ms. Sayantanee Bhattacharjee, Advocate Ms. Iti Dutta, Advocate Mr. Raja Saha, Advocate Mr. Avishek Prasad, Advocate Mr. Arka Kumar Nag, Advocate Mr. Sudipto Panda, Advocate 5 Ms. Munmun Tewary, Advocate Mr. Himadri Sekhar Chakraborty, Advocate Mr. Bibekananda Tripathy, Advocate Ms. Tapati Samanta, Advocate Mr. Gausul Alam, Advocate Mr. Md. Yusuf Ali, Advocate Mr. Arjun Roy Mukherjee, Advocate Ms. Chaitali Bhattacharya, Advocate Ms. Ranjana Har Chowdhury, Advocate Mr. Pinaki Bhattacharya, Advocate Mr. Shamim Ul-Bari, Advocate Mr. Sanjib Das, Advocate Mr. Manas Kundu, Advocate Mr. Debabrata Mondal, Advocate Mr. Biswajit Dey, Advocate Ms. Rajlakhsmi Ghatak, Advocate Mr. Somnath Naskar, Advocate Mr. Subrata Ghosh, Advocate Ms. Neelam Singh, Advocate Mr. Bibekanand Tripathi, Advocate .....for the State Dr. Sutanu Kumar Patra, Advocate Mr. Kanak Kiran Bandopadhyay, Advocate Ms. Debalina Chakraborty, Advocate Mr. Sunit Kumar Roy, Advocate Ms. Supriya Dubey, Advocate Mr. Sourav Mitra, Advocate ......for the SSC Mr. Santanu Kumar Mitra, Advocate Ms. Koyeli Bhattacharya, Advocate ......for the WBBSE Dr. Sutanu Kumar Patra, Advocate Mr. Sourav Mitra, Advocate, Mr. Sunit Kumar Roy, Advocate Ms. Supriya Dubey, Advocate ........for the WBCSSC All the aforesaid writ petitions have come up by way of assignment as the vires of Section 10C of the West Bengal School Service Commission Act, 1997 is under challenge.
Slew of litigations have been filed by the respective writ petitioners on being served with the order of transfer to the different schools taking a plea not only of the constitutional validity of the aforesaid section but also on other grounds, which, according to them, can never be recognized in a judicial dispensation.
6Some of the writ petitioners have taken medical ground, some have taken social compulsion, some on personal reason, but we think that the same would be decided at the later stage of the proceedings.
We do not intend to go into the veracity or the genuinity of such grounds having been assigned by each of the writ petitioners at this stage as our consideration is squeezed to vires of Section 10C of the said Act. We have been given to understand that in some of the writ petitions, an undertaking was given by the learned Advocate General that the State would not take any coercive steps during pendency of the instant writ petitions, but, subsequently, a policy/guideline was introduced, which, according to the learned Advocate General, brings more clarity, rationality and reasonability into the action of the State Authorities in transferring the teacher from one school to another.
On such score, this Court directed to filter out those cases, which have been filed after adoption of the guideline in order to find out whether any interim protection is required to be extended to such writ petitioners. The compilation of those cases were handed over to the Court as well as to the learned Advocate General to which the learned Advocate General submits that the same is not a fair compilation.
Be that as it may, we find that the school is closed for Summer Vacation and expected to reopen on 14th June 2023. However, it has been communicated to the Court that the State has declared the vacation without specifying the date of its reopening by using the expression "until further order".
Since the schools are closed for vacation, we feel that it would sub-serve the justice if the writ petitions are taken up and finally disposed of by the Bench during such vacation.
7Let these writ petitions be listed on 13th June 2023 as "Specially Fixed Matters" to be taken up at 2 p.m. We have been given to understand that till date the order of transfer has not been issued by the State as the School Service Commission has issued the recommendation to an appropriate forum to take a follow up action. Since the schools are closed for vacation and we have decided to dispose of the writ petitions, we feel that if any order of transfer is passed at this stage it may invite some inconvenience.
We, therefore, feel that no coercive action should be taken by the State for the time being. However, it will not prevent each of the writ petitioners in the event the order of transfer is issued by the authorities to join the transferred school without prejudice to their rights and contentions.
(Harish Tandon, J.) (Prasenjit Biswas, J.)