About 25% of Govt Schools in West Bengal Do Not Have a Head Master

Out of a total of 9,990 government schools in West Bengal, about 2,130 schools do not have a headmaster, as per sources in the school education department. This means, as many as 25 per cent of the state schools do not have any headmaster. This is likely due to the not recruiting headteachers on a long-term basis. As per the rules, a headteacher can be appointed for a period of seven years.

According to sources in the school education department, the state government wants to start a new recruitment process for appointing headteachers. The West Bengal Board Of Secondary Education (WBBSE) had earlier asked for a list of the total  number of vacant seats of headteachers. The list of the total number of vacancies have now been sent to the School Service Commission (SSC).

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The officials of the school education department have refused to accept that the increasing vacancies could be due to the headteachers being appointed only for a period of seven years, reported News18Hindi.

To appoint new headteachers, the rules will be changed. This means, the rules by which the headteachers were being appointed for so long will be altered. They will now be appointed on a category-wise basis. The school service commission will be sending a proposal to the state school education department to amend the law in this regard.

The commission is expected to issue the notification for the appointment of headteachers after the proposal to alter the rules is approved. The notification for the appointment for the headteachers could be out by next month.

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The West Bengal Education Minister Bratya Basu has already held several review meetings on the issue. In the last few months, there have been several allegations against the School Service Commission, including corruption. Several political parties have called out the recruitment process. Hence, the state government wants to appoint new headteachers. The commission did not respond to a request for comment.

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