Bengal to introduce biometric attendance system for primary teachers' recruitment exam

Kolkata, Oct 22 (IANS) Following several controversies over teacher recruitment at various levels, the West Bengal Board of Primary Education (WBBPE) has now decided to introduce biometric attendance system at the examination centres for recruitment of primary teachers in the state.

This will eliminate chances of a third person appearing for the written test on behalf of any candidate. This will be in addition to the decision already taken for video-recording the entire recruitment process, starting from written examination to marking of the optical mark recognition (OMR) sheets, interview and finally the counselling process.

Sources in the Education Department said that newly-appointed WBBPE President, Gautam Pal, wants to bring about total transparency in the entire recruitment process so that there is no chance for complaints on malpractices at a later stage.

Pal was offered the post after his predecessor and Trinamool Congress legislator Manik Bhattacharya was removed following an order of the Calcutta High Court.

Bhattacharya is in the custody of Enforcement Directorate now.

Pal in his first press conference after assuming the chair said that his priority is to make the recruitment process free of corruption through the introduction of absolute transparency in the system.

These moves to ensure transparency have been mooted at a time when former state Education Minister, Partha Chatterjee, and several top officials of the West Bengal School Service Commission (WBSSC) are in judicial custody for their alleged involvements in the teacher recruitment scam.

The Central Bureau of Investigation has recently submitted a charge-sheet to the Calcutta High Court where it pointed out cases where marks of ineligible candidates even submitting blank OMR sheets were as high as 53 in the server of WBSSC.