File photo of a protest by teachers who lost their jobs following a Supreme Court judgment on SSC appointments in Bengal.
Credit: PTI File Photo
Kolkata: A 35-year-old teacher, who was among the 26,000 people who lost their school jobs following a Supreme Court verdict on West Bengal SSC appointments earlier this year, died of a cerebral attack here on Friday, triggering protests by fellow agitators.
Subal Soren, who was a member of the Eligible Jobless Teachers Forum, fell ill on August 11 and was taken to Debra Hospital in Paschim Medinipur district, from where he was shifted to a private super-speciality hospital in Kolkata, where he was undergoing treatment for the last four days, his wife Sandhya Soren said.
Subal Soren died of a cerebral attack on Friday, an official of the hospital said.
Sandhya Soren said, "My husband was under tremendous stress after losing his job... what will happen to us now?" He is survived by his elderly parents, wife and two children.
Other members of the Forum staged a protest in front of the hospital over the death, alleging that the state School Service Commission's "tainted" selection process in 2016 led to the Supreme Court's judgment, causing immense stress to job-losing teachers.
Leader of the Opposition in the state assembly, Suvendu Adhikari, blamed the state government for the death of Soren.
"The deceased was suffering from hypertension since he lost his job. The state should own moral responsibility for the death of Soren who was a popular and efficient teacher," the BJP leader said.
TMC's Dantan MLA Bikramchandra Pradhan said Soren was popular among students and the party stood by the family.
He said the Supreme Court should look with a humanitarian approach into the issue of reinstating the deserving teachers.
The apex court in April invalidated the appointments of around 26,000 teachers and non-teaching staffers in state-run and aided schools in West Bengal, citing a "tainted and vitiated" selection process.