'Scrapping interviews for junior level posts meant to check malpractices in recruitment process'

He said abolition of interviews provided a level-playing field to aspirants. Singh said there has been encouraging feedback from the states which were prompt in discontinuing interviews in the selection for jobs soon after the Department of Personnel & Training issued a circular on ending the process of conducting interviews for Group ‘B’ non gazette posts, Group 'C’ and ‘D’ categories from January 1, 2016.

Union Minister Jitendra Singh on Friday said the Centre's decision to abolish interviews for junior level government posts was meant to check malpractices in the recruitment process. He said abolition of interviews provided a level-playing field to aspirants.

Singh said there has been encouraging feedback from the states which were prompt in discontinuing interviews in the selection for jobs soon after the Department of Personnel & Training issued a circular on ending the process of conducting interviews for Group ‘B’ non gazette posts, Group 'C’ and ‘D’ categories from January 1, 2016. Referring to Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra which were prompt in discontinuing interviews for selection of teachers and clerks respectively, the minister said the move has eliminated the role of middlemen who used to dupe the youth.

"These days even when there are only hundred vacancies advertised, the number of aspiring candidates is in thousands and, to conduct the interview for several days and engaging experts for the same is also a huge expenditure for the government," he said. "We have to put an end to this practice and motivate our youth to prepare themselves to compete through the written test," the minister said.

With the introduction of digital technology, human interference has minimized, as a result of which, there is virtually no room for manipulation of marks by anybody, he said. "This will also restore the confidence and faith of the youth in the recruitment process," he said.

Singh recalled that the prime minister on August 15, 2015 had first time suggested that the practice of holding interviews for recruitment at lower level in government could be done away with. Prime Minister Narendra Modi had said that he had seen the youth often looking for "sifarish" (recommendation) after receiving an interview call.

Singh said there had been allegations that on certain occasions, a candidate secured 95 per cent marks in written test but was dropped from selection list by giving only two marks in the interview, while a candidate who had secured least marks in the written test was undeservingly given high marks in an interview and thus inducted into the selection list for dubious considerations.

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