SC terms WB recruitment scam 'systemic fraud', says state was duty-bound to maintain records
New Delhi (PTI): Terming the alleged recruitment scam in West Bengal "systemic fraud", the Supreme Court on Tuesday said authorities were duty-bound to maintain the digitised records pertaining to the appointment of 25,753 teachers and non-teaching staff.
A bench comprising Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud and Justices J B Pardiwala and Manoj Misra was hearing a batch of petitions challenging the Calcutta High Court's April 22 decision that invalidated the appointment of 25,753 teachers and non-teaching staff in state-run and state-aided schools of West Bengal.
"The public job is so scarce.... Nothing remains if the faith of the public goes. This is systemic fraud. Public jobs are extremely scarce today and are looked at for social mobility. What remains in the system if their appointments are also maligned? People will lose faith, how do you countenance this?" the CJI asked the lawyers representing the state government.
The bench said the state government has nothing to show that the data was maintained by its authorities and asked about its availability.
"Either you have the data or you do not have it.... You were duty-bound to maintain the documents in digitised form. Now, it is obvious that there is no data. You are unaware of the fact that your service provider has engaged another agency. You had to maintain supervisory control," the bench told the state government's lawyers.
The hearing would resume at 2 pm.
Earlier, the state government had challenged the Calcutta High Court order, saying it cancelled the appointments "arbitrarily".
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Rohit Sharma lashes out at IPL broadcasters for breaching privacy
New Delhi, May 19: India skipper Rohit Sharma on Sunday lashed out at the IPL broadcasters for "breaching" cricketers' privacy by recording their conversations with friends and colleagues at training and on match days and then telecasting the contents.
Rohit expressed his disappointment after a video involving him and Kolkata Knight Riders assistant coach Abhishek Nayar, in which the former is seen contemplating his future at the Mumbai Indians, went viral.
"The lives of cricketers have become so intrusive that cameras are now recording every step and conversation we are having in privacy with our friends and colleagues, at training or on match days," Rohit posted on X.
He added, "Despite asking Star Sports to not record my conversation, it was and was also then played on air, which is a breach of privacy."
"The need to get exclusive content and focused only on views and engagement will one day break the trust between the fans, cricketers and cricket. Let better sense prevail."
Rohit was seen making a request to the broadcasters to shut down the audio while recording him after his chat with Nayar. The conversation between the two took place after MI's IPL fixture against KKR on May 11.
The audio of the chat was posted by KKR on their social media handle and fans assumed that the cricketer is speaking about leaving MI after the ongoing season.
Following the controversy, the video was taken down by the Knight Riders' social media team.
Few days after that, on May 17, Rohit was once again seen having a chat with Dhawal Kulkarni ahead of MI's fixture against Lucknow Super Giants. Seeing himself being recorded, the opener, with folded hands, requested the broadcaster to turn off the audio as one audio has already got him into trouble.
"Bhai audio band karo haan, already ek audio ne mera waat laga diya (Brother please close the audio, one audio has already made things difficult for me)," said Sharma in the video that also went viral.
