The Rajasthan High Court’s order on January 9 has directed the status quo to be maintained on the Sub Inspector (SI) recruitment exam 2021 which has highlighted the maladministration of the government service exams.

Rajasthan has struggled to hold exams, Uttar Pradesh (UP) struggled in 2024, and Bihar recently saw protests against the Bihar Public Service Commission (BPSC) preliminary exam.

The Rajasthan SI exam was held in September 2021 when the Congress government was in power. However, after the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) came to power in 2023, allegations of corruption surfaced.

It was alleged that some staff of Rajasthan Public Service Commission (RPSC) leaked the question paper for money and benefit of their relatives.

Subsequently, more than 150 people, including 50 elected candidates, were arrested.

Despite these revelations and the Advocate General’s recommendations, the Special Operations Group of the State Police, and the Rajasthan Police Headquarters, the Bhajan Lal Sharma government did not cancel the recruitment process.

After student protests in November 2024, the petitioners approached the Rajasthan High Court, demanding cancellation of the exam. The court stayed all further proceedings on November 19, 2024.

In the next hearing on 9 January 2025, the Sharma government said it did not want to cancel the exams ‘in haste’ without completing an inquiry into whether canceling the exams was the only option.

Hence, the Rajasthan High Court decided to maintain the status quo by restraining the state government from going ahead with the passing-out parade and field posting of selected candidates after training.

Rajasthan Govt may be right not to cancel the exam. However, re-examination comes at a heavy cost, and deserving candidates who qualify on merit lose out. However, the state government is unable to manage the perception around its moves.

The court even questioned the government as to why it did not trust its own committees and agencies when they recommended the cancellation of the exam. The state responded that the investigation is ongoing.

The biggest question is why the government could not complete its investigation in a year? It does not strengthen the government’s case when its own minister Kirudilal Meena questions its decisions.

Meena has been supporting the protesting students for a long time. In some cases, he calmed down students when protests turned aggressive, and at times, he prevented their detention by the police.

Meena has demanded the cancellation of the SI recruitment exam. “When unqualified candidates become station house officers, what will be the law and order situation of the state?” he asked.

Neighboring UP also failed the police recruitment test to fill constable vacancies at once.

After the cancellation of the exam on February 17-18, 2024 due to a paper leak, Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath vowed to conduct the exam again within six months.

While the constable exam was successfully conducted in August 2024, the same cannot be said about the recruitment exam of Reviewing Officers and Assistant Review Officers (RO/ARO). The exam was originally held on February 11, 2024 and was then canceled due to a paper leak.

UP Public Service Commission (UPPSC) announced that RO/ARO Exam will be conducted in November 2024. However, the scheduled examination was postponed due to protests against the conduct of examinations in different shifts and routine arbitrariness.

The four-day protests in November damaged Adityanath’s reputation as the administration initially tried to ignore the protesters and later tried to intimidate them into giving up the protests.

Ultimately, better sense prevailed, and UPPSC partially agreed to the candidates’ demand by conducting the Preliminary Provincial Civil Services (PCS) examination in a single shift, but did not accept it for the RO/ARO examination as one of the candidates A large number came out. For this, conducting the exam in a single shift makes it difficult.

Pending decision on whether the RO/ARO exam will be conducted in single or multiple shifts, the UP government has not yet decided the date of the re-examination.

According to media reports, the RO/ARO exam will now be conducted only after the Mahakamba Mela, which will be held from January 14 to February 26 in Prayagraj.

This would mean that the Adityanath government would not have conducted a re-examination to fill up the posts of RO/ARO even after a year of the paper leak.

Meanwhile, the BPSC preliminary examination to be held on December 13, 2024 in Bihar is witnessing an uproar over the alleged paper leak. Students have been protesting for almost two weeks demanding re-examination.

While leaders like Sooraj founder Prashant Kishor and Purnia Member of Parliament (MP) Pappu Yadav have supported the students’ demands, the Bihar government has maintained that the paper was not leaked.

Ahead of the exam process, BPSC has also released the answer key for the December 13 paper, while protesters are planning a Bihar bandh on January 12, which is National Youth Day.

The police action against protestors and the arrest of Kishore by force from the protest site to disrupt his hunger strike have given the protesters plenty of reasons to be angry with the government.

If the protests continue and the Bihar government fails to convince protest candidates, it may have to pay a heavy price by losing power in the assembly elections later this year.

What the cases of Rajasthan, UP and Bihar have in common is the failure of the state governments not only to conduct fair examinations but also to not take the aspirants into confidence when they press their demands.

Despite repeated failures, states have not developed a strategy to conduct fool-proof recruitment exams. This is not only eroding our demographic dividend but also eroding the confidence of the youth in their governments.