Kolkata: Around 500 protesters, who claimed to have qualified for the 2014 Teacher Eligibility Test (TET) but were still omitted from the merit list and were on a dharna on a road near the head office of the West Bengal Board of Primary Education in Salt Lake in North 24 Parganas district were dispersed on the intervening night of Thursday and Friday for violating the ban on large gatherings imposed there.
Videos showed them being dragged away and bundled into buses. Placards, slippers and newspapers headlining the 84-hour-long sit-in by teaching job seekers lay scattered at Karunamoyee area near Kolkata on Friday morning, hours after the police removed them from there, NDTV reported quoting news agency PTI.
The protesters, including women, were shouting slogans and speaking to the media on Thursday night, as the authorities were mobilising resources. A strong police contingent led by senior officers then took them in vehicles and dropped them at places in other parts of Kolkata, far away from the protest site.
Around 20 of the protesters, who sat on one flank of the road leading to the information technology hub Sector 5 area from October 17, were on fast from the next day and five of them were shifted to hospital after they fell ill on Thursday.
In the morning, however, some passers-by were seen looking at the spot covered with torn newspapers, discarded slippers of the protesters, some placards that had slogans like “Do or die” and plastic sheets on which they were sitting.
Police personnel present at the spot were seen asking people on foot and cars not to stop there and move on.
Three of the protesters – Achinta Samanta, Achinta Dhara and Arnab Ghosh – were detained by the police and were later released, a Bidhannagar Police Commissionerate official said.
#WATCH | West Bengal: Police personnel drag Teacher Eligibility Test (TET) qualified candidates who’re protesting near the head office of West Bengal Board of Primary Education in Kolkata regarding job recruitment. Section 144 of CrPC imposed in the area pic.twitter.com/Begne3eODc
— ANI (@ANI) October 21, 2022
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