SSRB changes criteria to favour non-Forestry candidates

Forestry grads being sidelined in recruitment of Foresters, FPF Inspectors

Early Times Report

SRINAGAR, Dec 28: Jammu & Kashmir Government Services Selection Board’s act of changing criteria in favour of non-Forestry candidates has drawn flak from around 500 unemployed Forestry graduates and post-graduates who have threatened to go on fast-unto-death if justice and transparency were compromised in the current process of recruitment of Foresters and Forest Protection Inspectors.

Subordinate Services Recruitment Board has on Monday notified 279 vacancies of Foresters and Inspectors in the state Forest Department and Forest Protection Force (FPF) respectively. In the previous process of recruitment in 2004, SSRB had fixed 40 points for 10+2 and 25 points for B Sc Forestry for the purpose of shortlisting of candidates.  In the Notification No: 08 of 2010 Dated 24-12-2010, Board has reduced weightage of the professional qualification, B Sc Forestry, from 25 to just 10 points. It has surprisingly added these 15 points to the ordinary qualification of 10+2, taking it to 55 from 40.

Without any plausible reason and logic, Board has fixed just 5 points for M Sc Forestry but tilted the balance in favour of non-Forestry ordinary science graduates with addition of 2 points to ordinary B Sc and 3 points to ordinary M Sc. Twenty points have been fixed for viva voce.

“This is clearly a brazen attempt of recruiting non-Forestry under-graduates and graduates against the professionally technical posts of Foresters and FPF Inspectors”, lamented a delegation of over 50 Forestry graduates and post-graduates who knocked at the doors of newspaper offices at Press Enclave here to seek justice. “It means that if you are simply 12^th pass or an ordinary B Sc in medical or non-medical streams, and you have the privilege of being a favourite of influential politicians and bureaucrats, you will be selected and those having B Sc or M Sc in Forestry would be dropped”, simplified one Nisar Ahmed who has been unsuccessfully looking for an ordinary job in the relevant field after completing his M Sc Forestry five years back.

Farooq Ahmed, who has been unemployed after completing his B Sc Forestry in 1998, said: “It’s unfortunate that Forest Minister Altaf Saheb, who is known for his honesty and integrity, has not deviated from the path of his much flayed predecessors---Sofi Mohiuddin, Tariq Hameed Qarra, Qazi Afzal---and disappointed 500 unemployed Forestry graduates and post- graduates”. He said that SSRB and Forest Department at Civil Secretariat had been passing the buck to each other and both were part of a conspiracy to get non-Forestry candidates appointed as Foresters and FPF Inspectors. He complained that State Public Service Commission had already done “great injustice” to the professionally qualified candidates in the current process of recruitment of Assistant Conservators of Forest (ACF) as all ordinary graduates and post-graduates had been declared eligible for the posts being filled up first time in last 27 years.

The delegation pointed out that one Dr Tariq, who had Ph D in Forestry, had been working against a temporary vacancy of Casual Labour since 1998 in State Forest Research Institute (SFRI) for Rs 4,000 a month. Few others having doctorate in Forestry had not been engaged even as daily wagers.

“Why does the Government and its SKUAST increase seats of B Sc Forestry and M Sc Forestry from 6 to 20 but does not allow the professionally trained candidates to become even Foresters? Why does the Government not issue a public interest notification to declare it publicly that B Sc, M Sc or Ph D in Forestry and related subjects was simply wastage of poor man’s money, time and energy?”, asked the delegation of men and women heading towards their age-bar of 37 years.

Yet another Forestry graduate, Tanvir, explained how SSRB officials had been manipulating the shortlisting process by entertaining fake marks certificates of favoured candidates. “They have a sinister system of verifying certificates from BOSE and Universities. They simply seek verification of certificates at a later stage without asking the Boards and Universities to furnish attested copies of full awards of the candidates”, he added. According to him, it was so simple to produce a fake marks certificate of 10+2 with high marks at the shortlisting stage. “Once you are selected and appointed, you produce your original certificates. At that stage officials simply seek confirmation of whether a certificate is fake or genuine. Nobody checks the marks and compares it to those mentioned in fake marks sheets at the shortlisting stage.

While nobody in SSRB responded to phone calls, Minister of Forest, Mian Altaf Ahmed, said that he would take up the matter with Chairman of Services Selection Board to ensure that there was no injustice to the professionally qualified and trained candidates.

END