Union minister of state for personnel, public grievances & pensions Dr Jitendra Singh disclosed said so far, interview for central government jobs has been abolished in 23 states and 8 Union territories of India.
The Union minister said this is a follow-up to the abolition of interview for Group-B (Non- Gazetted) and Group – C posts in the Central Government ever since 2016.
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Giving a brief about some of the path-breaking reforms brought in by the department of personnel & training (DoPT), Dr Singh recalled that it was on August 15, 2015, while speaking from the rampart of Red Fort on the occasion of Independence Day, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had suggested abolition of interview.
The PM suggested making the job selection totally on the basis of written test because whenever an interview call was received by a candidate, his entire family would get disturbed with apprehension and anxiety.
On a quick follow-up to the Prime Minister’s advice, Dr Singh said, the DoPT undertook an expeditious exercise and within three months completed the entire process to announce abolition of interview for recruitment in Central Government with effect from January 1, 2016.
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However, Dr Singh said while some states like Maharashtra and Gujarat were quick to implement this rule, there were other states which were quite reluctant to abolish the conduct of interview for jobs.
He expressed satisfaction that after quite a bit of persuasion and repeated reminders to certain state governments, today the practice of conducting interview stands discontinued in all the 8 Union territories of India including Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh, and 23 out of 28 states of the country.
Dr Singh said in the past, there had been complaints, grievances and allegations about marks in interview being manipulated to help certain favoured candidates.
The abolition of interview and considering only the written test marks as merit for selection, he said, offers an equal level-playing field to all the candidates.
In addition to bringing in transparency in the recruitment process, he said, several states have also reported heavy savings on the state exchequer because quite a substantial expenditure was being incurred in conducting interview of candidates whose number often ran in thousands and the process continued for several days.
Earlier there had often been complaints of the written test merit being compromised by lowering the interview marks of the candidate in order to help certain candidates for dubious considerations.
There were also allegations of job for money or heavy amounts being paid to secure jobs by manipulating the interview marks.