Jharkhand government removes compulsion of passing Class X and XII examinations for state government job recruitment

Making changes in the recruitment rules in Jharkhand Staff Selection Commission (JSSC), the state government has removed the compulsion of passing class X and XII examinations from the state. Notably, the Jharkhand High Court on December 16, 2022, had scrapped the 2021 recruitment rules for JSSC, under which, only the students who have passed X and XII examinations from the state were eligible for recruitment. Declaring it unconstitutional, the High Court had said that the rules framed by the State Government are not in accordance with Articles 14 and 16 of the Constitution stated a report by The New Indian Express.

Interestingly, JSSC recruitment rules-2021 had two conditions, firstly, the general category applicant has to pass Class X and XII examinations from any of the institutions in Jharkhand but it did not apply for reserved category candidates, and secondly, Hindi, English and Sanskrit were dropped from the list of local languages, making knowledge of regional and tribal languages as mandatory while Urdu was retained as one of the languages in the 12 language papers; both the conditions were dropped by the state government. The decision was taken during the cabinet meeting on Thursday, March 2, after seeking suggestions from the candidates appearing in different examinations in the state. 

With this, the recruitment rules formulated before 2016 remains effective. According to Cabinet Secretary in-charge Ajay Kumar Singh, the compulsion of passing Class X and XII from the state for appearing for government jobs in Jharkhand has been removed. "The compulsion of passing Class X and XII for the jobseekers has been removed from the recruitment rules," said Cabinet Secretary in-charge Ajay Kumar Singh as reported by The New Indian Express.

In addition to that, the criteria of being acquainted with the local customs and traditions of Jharkhand was also been dropped for appearing in any competitive examination, he added. Furthermore, Hindi, English and Sanskrit have also been added in the list of local languages. "Earlier, 12 tribal languages - Urdu, Santhali, Bangla, Mundari, Ho, Khadia, Kudukh, Kurmali, Khortha, Nagpuri, Pancpargania and Odia were there in the list of local languages, in which, Hindi, English and Sanskrit has been added making a total count to 18," said Singh.

Notably, in the wake of escalating resentment among youths preparing for various competitive examinations in Jharkhand as all recruitment processes were frozen after the scrapping of recruitment rules of JSSC by Jharkhand High Court, CM Hemant Soren had sought candidate's suggestions over the issue by calling them over phone. More than 75 per cent of the candidates had suggested him to go ahead with the recruitment rules effective in the state before 2016, stated The New Indian Express.