SHILLONG: After the High Court of Meghalaya on Friday directed a high level committee to dispose of the pending education scam case, the government said it would call a meeting soon to examine the report.
An official source said on Saturday the committee will meet shortly to examine the CBI report into the alleged anomalies in ten centres where recruitment for primary school teachers were conducted.
Earlier, the CBI had examined six centres and segregated both tainted and non tainted teachers.
The high court has replaced Chief Secretary PS Thangkhiew with Additional Chief Secretary in-charge political department as the former was named in the CBI report.
Thangkhiew was the principal secretary in-charge Education when the scam took place.
According to the order of the court on November 2, 2017, the chief secretary was asked to head the committee with two other members.
Earlier, when former chief secretary Y Tsering was heading the committee, a few meetings were held.
The order of the court in 2017 was that the CBI will probe ten centres other than Shillong Sadar, Jowai, Amlarem, Tura and Dadenggre and segregate the tainted and untainted candidates and submit its report to the chief secretary within six months.
The CBI submitted the report and the government constituted a three-member committee headed by the chief secretary.
The mandate of the committee is to examine the report of CBI and make final recommendation to the state government.
According to the court, if large scale manipulations or interference of public representative or any other person are found, the committee may recommend scrapping of whole selection process of the concerned centres.
The court had said, “If no illegalities and manipulations are found in any centre or if the extent of irregularities in any particular centre are not of higher magnitude and no case of interference by any public representative or any other person is found, the selection process of such centre may be approved by the committee subject to appropriate orders relating to the tainted or blameworthy candidate, if any; and the state government shall act accordingly”.
Later, during the hearing on Friday, the Advocate General pointed out that on February 26 this year, a petition was filed seeking extension of four months for the committee.
The court had extended the period of four months.
A meeting of the committee was also held on June 26 in the office chamber of the chief secretary. It was stated that since the present chief secretary was named in the CBI report relating to education scam as one of the accused, a proposal was mooted that the additional chief secretary in charge of political department be nominated as chairperson of the three-member committee in place of the chief secretary until the end of his tenure.
After the government sought extension for the committee, the court allowed the committee to examine the CBI report by additional chief secretary in-charge political department instead of chief secretary and the committee will have to submit the report within six months with specific stipulation that ‘this is the last opportunity and the order passed by the court will be strictly complied with before the expiry of the extended period’.
