The protestors said they will continue their agitation for job appointments.
The 2014 Teacher Eligibility Test (TET) qualified job-seekers staged a 22-hour protest in Kolkata, demanding their appointments, that have been denied to them. With banners announcing: 'We are the victims of 2014 primary corruption', over 1,000 2014 TET qualified all-night dharna, claiming that that the roles were ‘sold’ to unqualified pepoles by ruling TMC ministers.
Arnab Ghosh, joint secretary of the protesting TET Passers' Organisation, told Reporters on Tuesday morning that: “Our stand will continue until we get the appointment letter. Our stand against police terror will retain. A large number of police forces were deployed in the place.”
Another protester Santu Das alleged: "Even though we passed TET in 2014, unqualified candidates had been given jobs by secretly sending SMS. Our onliest demand is to return our rightful jobs. This movement will hold until the appointment letter is received.”
Mohammad Swab Ansari from Murshidabad, a job-seeker who took part in the protest, said: “The new president of the Primary Education Board is trying to mix up the job aspirants of 2014 and 2017. There is a brand new plot to create confusion about our jobs.”
The protesters stated 8 years have passed since they cleared the TET exam, but till now they don't have any jobs. For the past one and a half years, they were agitating against not been appointed. Now, they've once again come to the streets to demand their jobs.
On Monday, thousands of TET passed job-seekers protested by lying in front of the APJ Building, Salt Lake, the head office of the Board of Primary Education, with banners, placards and festunes. However, the Rapid Action Force (RAF) were called by the government to scare the protestors.
Some job aspirants, inclusive of Tanima Das of Pashchim Medinipur, Jhuma Haldar of Malda, Rakhi Kole of Purba Medinipur, Debasmita Mandal of South 24 Parganas fell ill on the spot, not able to endure the excessive heat, stated some protesters. They also claimed that the police detained some of them by way of forcibly pushing them into jail trucks.
Meanwhile, 4 protesters were stopped from submitting a memorandum at the APC building, and have started a starvation strike, until they're appointed.
One of the protesters told Reporters: "We are trained, non-included job aspirants who passed TET in 2014. Why are we being asked to seem again for interviews? We will not accept this."
She added to her comment: "Suppose, as per the Chief Minister's announcement, we gave the second one interview. She said there might be 20,000 appointments. But we discovered out through RTI (Right to Information) that only 13,000 appointments have been made. The last 7,000 appointments have no longer been made."
Meanwhile, Indrajit Ghosh, a leader of the Centre of Indian Trade Unions(CITU) met the protesters at the dharna site around night time. “The boys and girls were sitting and sleeping under the open sky and the thieves are dozing at home with the comfort of AC. We will make them sleepless. Thieves should be jailed. Jobs will be given to those who are qualified. The fight against those thieves will continue,” he stated.
