Written by Siddhant Sharma
Railway job aspirants have been protesting for the past several days in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, and some exercised Bihar Bandh on January 28 to protest against the alleged irregularities in the Railway Recruitment Board's Non-Technical Popular Categories (RRB-NTPC) and Group D exams. Thousands of protesting students blocked railway lines, and the protests turned violent at some places. Videos of several policemen brutally thrashing allegedly innocent students went viral. FIRs have been lodged against teachers, coaching centers and many unidentified persons for inciting violence and damaging government property.

Railway Recruitment Board (RRB) organizes examinations and recruits applicants for filling in various vacant positions in the Indian Railways. The examinations which are currently the reason for contention between the Centre and the students are RRB NTPC Recruitment Exam and Group D Level 1 exam. Both these exams are for the year 2019, and applicants have been in limbo ever since then due to inordinate delays in conducting exams and declaring results.

What is the controversy?

RRB-NTPC exam

Railway Recruitment Board's Non-Technical Popular Categories (RRB-NTPC) exam is conducted to fill various positions between Level 2 and Level 6. The eligibility criterias are also quite different for these posts. For example, a Level 2 post is open to those who have at least passed class 12th (non-graduate) whereas a Level 6 post is only open to those who have at least passed graduation. These exams are conducted in two stages- CBT-1 and CBT-2. The RRB NTPC exam notification (Detailed Centralized Employment Notice CEN-01/2019) was issued on 28th February 2019 for about 35,000 vacancies. For these 35,000 posts about 1.25 crore students had applied. The CBT-1 was to be held in September of the same year, but it got delayed. Then the pandemic started, and after some protests it was finally conducted from 28th December 2020 to 31st July 2021 in 7 different phases. Even after the CBT-1 was conducted, RRB was delaying the results. The students had to protest for that too, and on 15 January 2022 the results were announced.

The students allege that the current system is such that candidates with higher qualifications can also compete for jobs that are meant for candidates with lower qualifications. This allegation is although right but technically unsounded because the word ‘minimum’ but not ‘maximum’ has been used to notify that the minimum educational qualification of 12th standard is the criteria for Level 2 and 3 posts (non-graduate), and therefore, any person holding a higher degree than the said standard is also allowed for applying for the said posts. Similarly, for Levels 4, 5, and 6 posts (graduate posts), the minimum educational qualification is a university degree (principally a graduation degree), and therefore, any person having a degree higher than a graduation degree can also apply for these said posts. The government is stuck here because technically it cannot bar a candidate to appear for an exam because they are overqualified.

Para 13.1 of the notification effectively says that both graduate and non-graduate posts’ applicants will be having the same question paper in CBT-1. After the CBT-1 results were announced, about 7,00,000 candidates (comprising both graduates and non-graduates) were shortlisted to appear for CBT-2. RRB had mentioned in the notification that the number of candidates selected for CBT-2 will be 20 times the vacancy. So 35,000 times 20 is 7,00,000. Consequentially, in the list of 7,00,000 applicants, graduated students who have appeared for both graduate and non-graduate posts and successfully cracked both in CBT-1, their names have appeared more than once in the list as it shortlists candidates for CBT-2. However, finally, an applicant eligible for both graduate and non-graduate posts, based on his merit, shall get only one post and thereby, has to vacate the other ones he had occupied at the first stage (Para 1.11 of the notification). However, such subsequent vacancies have never been filled up by the RRB as it has never published any waiting list despite having power to do so (Para 1.11 of the notification).

Another question the students are raising is— how could there be different cut-off marks for both graduates and non-graduates answering the same question paper? The students also allege that the cut-offs for the graduates were lower and more accessible, and the cut-offs for the non-graduates were higher and more difficult. If this allegation is true, then this is a violation of Para 13.1 of the job notification and Article 14 of the Constitution, because at the first stage, RRB is treating both graduate and non-graduate applicants equally by making them answer the same question paper but thereafter treating the same unequally by different cut-offs on the same question paper.

Group D exam

Apart from the NTPC students, Railway Group D students are also protesting. The notification for Group D Level 1 exam (Detailed Centralized Employment Notice RRC-01/2019) was posted in March 2019. This exam was also postponed and later on delayed due to the pandemic. For about 1 lakh vacancies, over 1.15 crore students had applied. On 24th January 2022 a notification was released stating that Group D exams will be conducted in February 2022. But in this notification it was mentioned that "In view of the large number of applications received, Railways have decided to conduct Two Stage Computer Based Tests (CBTs)Two Stage Computer Based Tests (CBTs)". The students aren’t given much time to prepare for two exams. Additionally, the procedure for normalization of marks was also changed.

Students say that the notification was first released in 2019 and the exams have not been conducted up till now, so the application volume is high because of the government's own mismanagement and delays. They argue that the government cannot introduce a new paper at the last minute and make the clearing criteria doubly difficult because more candidates have applied.

However, the government denied this allegation saying that the original notification clearly mentioned that CBT-2 will also be held.

Till 23rd January 2022, only NTPC students were protesting and that too mostly on social media, some physical protests were held but they were non-violent. It was only after Group D notification that more students joined in and eventually the protests went out of control and became violent.

The Railway Ministry has formed a committee that will examine the grievances of the students. After listening to both the parties, the committee will submit a report to the ministry by March 4. RRB has also decided to suspend the NTPC and Level 1 tests for now.

The flames of hunger are more violent than flames of expectations, and when there is both expectations and hunger then there is a disaster.

Edited by Hritam Saha

When there is a deadlock at the headlock of corona and politics....

[Continued].... the people of India have to resort to voting at the expense of their life; political ideologies incarnate into political idiosyncrasies incarcerating the idea of the 'Union of States'; a relay race of shifting responsibility without a finishing point takes place between the government of a State and the government of India and the arrival of many other alike beings take place.All when summed up makes the life and limbs of the common people susceptible to the ears and eyes of the COVID-19.History is a witness, which when called upon, has reiteratedly enunciated that war and crisis makes a government unipersonal. Such power then suffuses over every branch, for instance, Reporters Across Borders purported that 38 countries have hijacked freedom of the press.Many governments have enacted emergency laws to address the pandemic, like new powers of detention, closing non-essential businesses, limiting public gatherings and movement, monitoring the streets to ensure they remain inside.Some countries have also invoked emergency like Armenia, Estonia, Georgia, Latvia, Moldova and Romania. These actions though made in good faith have inseparable repercussions, for instance in Philipines, people are violently detained, belaboured and even killed for being cold with the restrictive orders, and when the actions of the authorities were questioned they justified themselves by colouring their cause of actions with unintelligible crayons. Miniscule of Confrontations has also been witnessed between the armed forces and people in the United States, Greece and Germany.It is a watertight proposition that lockdown has sent the human rights in hibernation though such has been done with good intentions. Still, severing the accountability from the largest picture of lockdown was a cancerous dream that indeed took the form of reality.In India, the largest picture was the inexplicable ever walking hunger march of the migrant workers which perhaps would remain a never-ending march for their families. The government of a state has invested their burden to another state stating the workers are not domiciled in their state. But that is why they are called migrant workers, not just workers. In such circumstances, the centre had graced the situation with absolute silence even though they have conveyed ration to the states but had not pressed anything for the migrants. At that time the Supreme Court, in its wisdom, deemed fit to take a resolution of disappearing with the sunset and not to rise with the sun.Are not these instances exemplifying the uninterrupted dictation of the governments?During the election this year, a newspaper in its print considered voting as the 'dance of democracy'. But I think it was a curtain-raiser. The subsequent substantive of the story was the 'uninvited dance of life shedding'.Politics in simpler and unharmful terms are disagreements that are conciliated and reconciled by deliberations.But here exists palatable incommunicado between the people in power due to their political constipation. But their speeches at biggish stages were that incandescent that it called upon horde of people to throng in their sabhas.Later, it was understood that people were there to assuage their stomach emptiness, not to imbibe the rhetorics of ever germinating politicians, because the number of people who were present there in a party's sabha did not commensurate with the number of votes that the party has received.The pandemic had a huge impact upon the economy, resulting in the imbalance of an already imbalanced socio-economic structure of the society which has been the blue and black to those people whose stomach's appetite solely compliments their daily actions.Comparing the GDP havoc endured by the countries, to approximate one country's efficacy over another against this pandemic is unwanted because every country has been unavoidably compelled by the virus to receive its invitation of downfall in every aspect, and the attendance of the people of some countries to such invitation has been either more or less but not null.Yes, it is indisputable that unemployment, societal disjunction, hunger, domestic violence, depression, etc., all together have increased. But can anybody assert that these were never there before this pandemic? I think the answer would be a big NO.'Health is wealth.' When we say this, things like unemployment and poverty are very much present, thus, we don't have a vibrant economy and the corollary is 'no wealth'. Hence, the other name of 'health is wealth' is, "as there is no wealth there is no health".Some say that a vibrant health system would not have been a guarantee against this pandemic. Yes, indeed, it could not have been a guarantee but it could have been a warranty, that is assurance rather than the commitment, that is guarantee. But here, the government knows that a vibrant health system could not be a shield of guarantee without even trying to make it happen. The drops of Astrology and drops of science are both in positives. Therefore they repel each other.The game of touchable and untouchable, black and white, etc. have been widely familiar for human beings across the world. Like in India, the 'so-called upper castes' purport that they would be contaminated if they come into contact with the 'untouchables' and somewhat similar reasons are for the differences between the whites and blacks. Hence, its a game of illusory contagiousness. But the game is a bit different in the case of COVID-19. If an 'upper caste' person comes into contact with an 'untouchable', he would not get contaminated because in the light of science, there is no trace of contamination. But yeah, those people could get mentally contaminated as they claim to be. In contrast to such, SARS-CoV-2 (the virus which spreads COVID-19) can spread to all humans. Yes, you've again read it correctly, HUMANS. It does not discriminates between touchables and untouchables or whites and blacks, and one more point, this contamination can take the lives of the people, whereas in the previous case, the mentally contaminated ones take the lives of those who had 'contaminated' them as a compensation for their illusory damages.And what politics does in such cases, it encashes such disaster to transform it into a never-ending one for the sake of meeting their political ends, where end means an extension of infinite hedonism with sheer impunity.But this time, politics has averted from the game which was unfolding against the healthcare personnels. Why? Because such a game would have inflicted everyone including politics. Therefore, politics obituaries for its administrators and not for those who have chosen politics to govern them.Let's talk about the elections. Were there no ways available to cherish democracy other than to conduct the elections in this pandemic? If no, then were there no ways left for the politics to witness people's throng without creating the opportunity for the people to reach out to politics physically? Was it needed to apprise people about their past and would be, via rallies?Many in the history of India had shed blood to earn freedom, we, the people of India have tenaciously deliberated to gift ourselves a written Constitution and democracy is a vital cog of it. As said that voting is a 'dance of democracy' and to actualize democracy, elections are conducted. "Had the framers of our constitution ever conceived the thought of witnessing such dance at the expense of people's life?"We are so determined to see the dance of democracy that we have forgotten to evoke the gorgeous dance of the celebrities. At least such would have impeded us to witness the buffoon dance of the politicians and perhaps could have protected lives, but yes, the latter can be witnessed free of cost and also with a toast of food. And why not? It is performed every five years.The multi-polarization of political beliefs at the expense of uniform goal in national interest and discrimination of religious beliefs have now been adjoined by the discrimination of the technological accessibility of people as there has been seen a sharp division among classes regarding the technological means.Has this pandemic compartmentalized human beings in every aspect? The answer seems to be still under construction.The deadlock at the headlock of corona and politics may completely end one day but for the time being, the relaxation of the deadlock is in progress at the effacement of the population.But the question that will remain to be discussed is, "What would happen after the clearance of the deadlock at the headlock of COVID-19 and politics". As of now, COVID-19 is in a headlock with politics and vice versa. But after the expungement of the pandemic, will the headlock by politics to the livelihood of people, would remain? Headlock by rich to the poor, employment to unemployment, vibrant medical structure to precarious medical structure, etc? The future would author and the past would readout.The gravitation of the earth pulls people down for the sake of stability. But the human structured rockets supersede this pull to expel itself from the earth to the space. We human beings are not rockets. Therefore no one is more and no one is less in respect of being stable. Therefore one may discriminate against an individual in every aspect and respect other than the means of stability. Because stability is the law of nature but not of humans.Views are personalWritten by Hritam Saha(Edited by Siddhant Sharma)

What is the controversy?

RRB-NTPC exam

Group D exam

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