The results of 2021 just announced by J&K Public Service Commission after a gape of two years is undoubtedly a new beginning as not even a single allegation against the entire selection process for J&K Combined Competitive Examination 2021 has been recorded either from Kashmir Valley or Jammu division. The results have shown that selections are always about merit and transparency in recruitment processes but not about regional balancing by political parties in power witnessed during the reigns of successive popular governments of erstwhile Jammu & Kashmir state for decades together. While people of Jammu & Kashmir won’t never ever forget the mass irregularities of 1984 combined Services Examination when J&K Public Service Commission conducted it under the leadership of most discredited Chairman Nazir Ahmed Ahmad Khan, the people of Jammu & Kashmir won’t also hereafter forget the transparency shown in the conduct of J&K Combined Competitive Examination 2021 by J&K PSC under the leadership of a Chairman who does not belong to Jammu & Kashmir . Irrefutable fact is that Supreme Court ordered the induction of over 50 candidates in J&K Combined Service in 1992 after they were denied right to appointment even after qualifying the examination in the year 1984. What matters the most is the fact that J&K Government could not conduct Combined Services Examination for about a decade after getting engaged into a long drawn legal battle with the aggrieved candidates that ended in the supreme court of the country with a record making verdict against the J&K Government forcing it to appoint all the petitioners.
The leaders of previous popular Governments themselves responsible for mass irregularities during their reigns of power in several recruitment processes conducted by J&K PSC, J&K SSB and Board Of Professional Entrance Examination (BOPEE) must take lessons from the non intervention of the incumbent Government in the conduct of entire selection process of J&K Combined Competitive Examination 2021.
While the incumbent Chairman and members of J&K Public Service Commission (J&K PSC) deserve full compliments for the transparency they have shown in conducting J&K Combined Competitive Examination 2021, the credit to facilitate the record making transparency in the conduct of this Combined Competitive Examination goes to Lt Governor Manoj Siha, his Advisor Rajeev Rai Bhatnagar, Chief Secretary Dr A K Mehta and the incumbent administrative secretaries of all the Government departments as they by the dint of their actions showed complete not intervention in the conduct of entire selection process even after the appointment of Satish Chandra a veteran IAS officer as new Chairman J&K PSC last year. The leaders of previous popular Governments themselves responsible for mass irregularities during their reigns of power in several recruitment processes conducted by J&K PSC, J&K SSB and Board Of Professional Entrance Examination (BOPEE) must take lessons from the non intervention of the incumbent Government in the conduct of entire selection process of J&K Combined Competitive Examination 2021. Never forget that Lt Governor Manoj Sinha showed Zero tolerance against irregularities in recruitment processes by cancelling the recruitment process of J&K Police Sub Inspectors and J&K Accounts Assistants by J&K SSB and referring the issues for investigation to Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) the highest investigative agency of the Central Government. People don’t still forget the controversy that surrounded the selection of one of the close relations of a former Chief Minister in the recruitment of certain post in J&K Khadi Village Board & Industries in Jammu somewhere between 2017 and 2018 and people won’t also forget the appointment of three blue eyed boys of a cabinet minister of social welfare department somewhere between 2016 and 2017 and he now tends to be contender for the post of Chief Minister in the next assembly elections in Jammu & Kashmir. So keeping in view the fact that while the mass irregularities of 1984 combined Services Examination are unforgettable, the transparency established in the conduct of 2023 Combined Competitive Examination is a good beginning that needs to be carried forward in the conduct of other recruitment processes likely to be conducted in coming years and months.