Telangana:HC order tomorrow as fate of 2 lakh-plus job aspirants hangs in balance

The fate of 2.33 lakh aspirants of the Telangana Public Service Commission (TSPSC) Group-1 services is hanging in balance as the Telangana High Court is expected to decide on the cancellation of the preliminary examination on Wednesday (September 27).

A single-judge bench of the Telangana High Court on Saturday cancelled the examination held on June 11, disposing of the writ petitions filed by many aspirants who feared impersonation and manipulation as proper security guidelines were not followed by TSPSC while conducting the exam.

The petitioner-aspirants highlighted many lapses in observing security measures to avoid impersonation of the candidates and urged the court to cancel the exam.

The TSPSC challenged the decision of the single-judge bench. The matter came up on Tuesday before the Bench of Justices Abhinad Kumar Shavili and Anil Kumar Jukanti.

The first exam held on October 16, 2022 was cancelled in March 2023 on grounds of a question paper leak. A special investigation team (SIT) appointed by the government confirmed the leak, forcing the TSPSC to axe the test and re-conduct it on June 11, 2023.

Examination blues

This also ran into controversy, with many aspirants filing writ petitions for cancellation of the examination.

Justice P Madhavi Devi of the High Court on September 23 ordered the cancellation on the ground that proper biometrics were not followed while allowing aspirants into the exam centres.

There was also a mismatch between OMR (optical mark recognition) sheets and aspirants who wrote the test. The court ruled that “…the respondent (TSPSC) does not appear to be careful either in conducting the examination or in correlating the data of the candidates who appeared for the examination for Group-I services in spite of its importance and its impact on the candidates”.

This is not the first exam to be cancelled by TSPSC on charges of question paper leaks or irregularities. All the exams it notified since 2022 have been spiked. The list includes exams for the posts of Junior Lecturers, Assistant Engineers, Town Planning Officers, Division Accounts Officers, Motor Vehicle Inspectors and Assistant Executive Engineers.

Paper leak

Question paper leak is suspected in every exam in the wake of Group 1 question paper leak. With this, the TSPSC has become the most unreliable and unpopular institution in the state in the eyes of the aspirants.

In fact, this was the first attempt by the Telangana government to fill the vacancies in Group-1 services after the formation of Telangana in 2014. When the first prelims exam was held on October 16, 2022, as many as 2.86 lakh took the exams. However, when the exam was re-conducted on June 11, 2023, the number drastically fell to just 2.32 lakh.

The fall is indicative of the trust deficit in the TSPSC, said a retired professor from Osmania University, who attended TSPSC interviews as a subject expert. “Majority families in Telangana have one or two unemployed youth who pinned their hopes on TSPSC. The TSPSC’s failure to conduct the exams fairly has created a kind of crisis in the families as every student had spent lakhs on coaching and for staying in Hyderabad for over nine years,” he said.

Sources in the commission said that in the past nine years, the TSPSC could recruit just 35,000 people which means 3,500 jobs per year on average when the number of unemployed youths registered with TSPSC is about 30 lakhs.

Analysts say the bungling by the TSPSC is a setback for the BRS government led by Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao at a time when the Telangana Congress promised to fill 2 lakh vacancies in the first year itself if it comes to power in Assembly elections.

Hollow claims

It was KCR who first promised during the Telangana movement to fill the 2 lakh jobs once Telangana was achieved. Slowly the government scaled down the number to one lakh. After eight years of state formation, in March 2022, the chief minister announced plans to fill 80,000 vacancies. But not a fraction has been filled so far.

Jobs was one of the three battle cries of the statehood movement, the other two being water and funds.

The National Students Union of India (NSUI) has called for a boycott of the TSPSC. NSUI Telangana president Balmuri Venkat, who has been leading the legal battle against TSPSC irregularities, has been demanding the removal of the existing commission led by former IAS officer B Janardhan Reddy.

“No exam should be conducted as long as the tainted body is not sacked,” Balmuri said. The NSUI wants to launch a legal battle for a compensation of Rs 1 lakh for those who foregone the exam twice due to cancellation.

Legal battle

“We are consulting legal experts to sue the TSPSC for compensation at the rate of Rs 1 lakh for every student who appeared for the exam,” he said. Many observers agree that TSPSC’s reputation fell to its nadir during Reddy’s time.

When the matter came up for hearing on Tuesday, the Division Bench expressed shock at how TSPSC had allowed paper leaks and biometric lapses. It found fault with the Commission for doing away with the biometrics for candidates at the last moment on the pretext of a technical snag.

The Bench has asked the Commission to submit data regarding biometrics at the exam centres and the details of companies the biometrics outsourced to by Wednesday.