Telangana: Why TSPSC question paper leak is a bolt from the blue for job aspirants

“What I feared has happened,” said a despondent 33-year-old Ganji Manohar (name changed). Since Friday, the son of a weaver from Karimnagar district has not had any food. His dream got shattered when the Telangana State Public Service Commission (TSPSC) announced that the preliminary Exam Group 1 had been cancelled and fresh one would be held in June 2023.

Manohar had been preparing for the test since 2017. He took coaching, spending a lakh of rupees on institute fee and books. He lives in a dingy room in Dilsukh Nagar of Hyderabad with friends. The preliminary test was held in October 2022. He cracked the exam, whose result was announced in January 2023.

With a dream of becoming a Revenue Divisional Officer RDO, he has been seriously preparing for the Mains scheduled in June. Now, the exam has been cancelled as the inquiry of the Special Investigation Team (SIT) found that the question paper had been leaked.

Manohar is crestfallen because, given the anger in the state, there is no guarantee that the exam will be held in June. His parents too are disheartened.

Manohar is one among the 25,000 aspirants selected on a 1:50 basis for Mains. In the last 24 hours, the TSPSC has cancelled three exams — Group-1, Assistant Executive Engineers (AEE) and Divisional Accounts Officers (DAO). Now 4-5 lakh students who had written the exam have to take it again.

SIT Inquiry

The SIT was appointed following the commotion over the suspected leak of the question paper of AEE exam held on February 27. Some unknown people brought it to the notice of the police on March 11. News about the leak surfaced when the opposition voice is getting louder and the morale of the government is low due to the alleged involvement of Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao’s daughter K Kavitha in the Delhi liquor scam.

All opposition parties called for protests. Rattled by the clamour for inquiry by a sitting judge or a CBI probe, the government appointed an SIT headed by additional commissioner AR Das.

The SIT immediately found P Praveen, PA to Secretary, TSPSC, responsible for the leak not only of the AEE Exam but also many other exams. A pen drive confiscated from Praveen, according to SIT, had question papers of all 15 exams held in the past six months. Praveen was taken into custody along with a network administrator, A Rajasekhar Reddy, and seven others, who are said to have colluded with Praveen.

What surprised many is that Praveen, who entered TSPSC on compassionate grounds, had scored the highest with 103 marks in Group-1 preliminary. TSPSC sources said he seems to have been honey trapped to leak the papers. The opposition dismissed the theory stating it was floated to protect the bigwigs behind the scandal.

Youths cheated

The educated unemployed have been taken for a ride by the TRS (now BRS) government ever since the state was formed in 2014. During the Telangana agitation, KCR promised that each family would get a job once statehood was realized.  As many as 2 lakh jobs were shown and he vowed to fill up all the vacancies.

To prove that this was not an empty assurance, KCR had incorporated the jobs (Niyamakalu) into the battle cry of Telangana Neellu, Nidhulu and Niyamakalu (Water, Funds and Jobs). The slogan electrified the movement. The dream of a government job had not only excited the students to take the lead role in the movement, it also brought their families into the movement.

Prof Kodandaram, who was at the forefront of the Telangana movement along with KCR, says Telangana’s youths are disillusioned as the KCR government has almost stopped the recruitment.

“After the creation of 21 new districts, jobs in the government are supposed to go up. As per our estimates there are about 3 lakh jobs in the government. But the government once said there were only 1.08 lakh vacancies. How many have been filled? Not more than 25,000 in nine years,” Kodandaram, who launched a Telangana Jana Samiti after parting ways with KCR, told The Federal.

TSPSC berated

TSPSC, a constitutional body, has become the most unpopular government entity in Telangana state. “Nobody knows when it issues notification for jobs. If the notification is issued, there is no guarantee the exam will be held. If the exam is held, there is not guarantee the question paper is not leaked. If there is no leak, there is guarantee that it does not land up in a court case,” a job aspirant summarised the functioning of TSPSC.

He cited the case of Group 2-A recruitment as proof. “The notification was issued in 2015. Exam was conducted in 2016. The process took four years to conclude after many court cases. The poor setting of Question Paper, wrong answers and double answers… the first Group-2 exam in the state stands testimony to the non-professionalism of TSPSC,” the young man who does not want to be named said.

With the cancelling of three exams, a demand for cancelling all exams conducted in Telangana state is being raised. New doubts are being raised over the conduct of Group-1 exam in 2016 as well.

The notification for the recruitment was issued in 2011 in united Andhra Pradesh. The preliminary was conducted. But the process could not be concluded. So, after the formation of Telangana 2014, preliminary was re-conducted in 2016 and recruitment took place in 2017.

Governor moved

On Friday, a few aspirants wrote to the governor to cancel this exam as well because the question paper leak was suspected in 2016 itself. But it failed to snowball into a protest movement.

“If you have money, you can get the TSPSC question papers as easily as you can get a photo copy from the Xerox centre. The government has never thought of making the TSPSC inaccessible to miscreants. This has given rise to doubts about all exams in the minds of the youth,” Prof Kodandaram said.

Former IPS officer Dr RS Praveen Kumar, who leads the Bahujan Samaj Party in Telangana, alleged that the chief minister’s family was involved in the leak of question papers.

When in service, Dr Praveen had headed the Telangana Social Welfare Residential Educational Institutions Society and transformed them into centres of excellence. He told the media that he had evidence regarding the involvement of the chief minister’s family and would furnish details if a probe was instituted by a sitting High Court Judge or the CBI.

“I don’t believe in the SIT. It would only cover up and serve the purpose of the government,” he said, urging the governor to sack the Chairman of TSPSC using her discretionary powers under Article 317 of the Constitution.

“The lapse of TSPSC is unpardonable,” he added. “The TSPSC’s confidential room lacked any digital security mechanism needed to preserve the material that has the potential to affect the lives of 30 lakh students. How the password of high-security computers that should have remained with the Chairman alone reached the low-level employees. The Chairman is solely responsible for the lackadaisical attitude. He should be sacked,“ the former cop said.

Opposition cries foul

BJP President Bandi Sanjay, TPCC president A Revanth Reddy, CLP leader Bhatti Vikramarkha and Left Parties demanded an inquiry by a sitting judge or CBI. Political parties, students and youths staged protests all across the state.

All political parties demanded the resignation of IT minister KT Ramarao as he was the in-charge of TS Technology Services Ltd which is responsible for the security of computers of the Confidential Room in TSPSC. They sought Rs 1 lakh compensation for the aspirants who took the exams as they had spent huge amounts on their preparation.

IT Minister Ramarao dismissed the demand for his resignation. “In Gujarat, the Public Service Question Papers have been leaked 13 times. Did you demand the resignation of Narendra Modi?” Ramarao retorted.

He said a constitutional body like TSPSC should not be held responsible for a mistake committed by one individual.

Ultimately, however, the episode is a reputation disaster for TSPSC which will be difficult to restore.