5,528 applicants marked absent in Cachar; Karimganj MLA claims candidates couldn't reach due to traffic jam

The Direct Recruitment Examinations for various grade III and Grade IV posts were held today in Assam. The examination was held to fill over 30,000 seats and over 14 lakh candidates registered for the examination. Today was the first day of the written examination for grade IV posts and it was held in 25 districts of Assam. 

Karimganj and Hailakandi districts didn’t have any examination centres and the candidates from these two districts had to choose Cachar for their exam centres. This was a huge inconvenience for the candidates of the neighbouring districts and many couldn’t reach their exam centre on time owing to the huge line of stuck vehicles reaching Cachar from the two districts. The Hailakandi Police tweeted early this morning to contact them if any candidate is stuck in the Panchgram-Katakhal route, but nothing worked and many missed the chance of appearing in the examinations.

The North Karimganj MLA, Kamalakhya Dey Purkayastha has spoken against this and blamed the CM for this gross negligence.

The opposition MLA questioned the government on why centres were not allocated for these two districts. The MLA has shared a video online and said, “When the exam centres were allotted, I requested the CM to assign centres in Karimganj and Hailakandi as well. Why only Cachar? Back then he ignored the question and said he would see. Don’t we pay tax from Karimganj and Hailakandi? Then I raised the same question at Vidhan Sabha, but the government still didn’t provide any exam centre in the two districts. The truth is, the CM is only about making statements and tall promises but doesn’t have the simple capacity to provide an exam centre for a state government examination”.

Talking about the collective responsibility of the MLAs of these two districts, he said, “When I raised the questions in front of the state government, all other MLAs and MPs from these districts were silent. Some are scared to lose their position and others fear not getting a ticket in the next election. It is the collective responsibility of the public representatives and silence on such an issue is not service to the public who voted for them. Who’s responsible for the young boys and girls, who were standing in the queue to reach the exam hall but couldn’t? The elected representatives must answer this question”.

Taking a jibe at the silent MLAs and MPs, Dey Purkayastha further said, “As an MLA today I’m ashamed to see that, even in such an issue you are playing party politics. Doesn’t matter if you are from the ruling party, but if the government is lacking in providing proper facilities to the youth of our region, we have to raise our voice. Even after having 15 elected MLAs, we couldn’t unite for this cause. Today we have to unite, at least for the youth of Barak Valley. In this way, you can’t call this recruitment transparent and fair”.

The Congress leader has urged the other MLAs to unite for the next examination which is scheduled on August 28 and asked all the public representatives to question the government and provide adequate facilities for the youth to reach the examination centres.

As per the latest available information, 4,445 applicants remained absent for paper one and 1,083 were marked absent for paper two.

The direct recruitment examination was held at 118 centres in Cachar in the first shift and 18 in the second. Almost 74 thousand candidates had their examination centre in Cachar. Section 144 of the Cr. P. C was imposed within a 100-metre radius of the exam centres. Along with that, the Internet services were suspended for a total of 6 hours in the districts conducting examinations.