‘Unacceptable, unwarranted’: Bihar recruitment body ticks off education dept

BPSC also hit back at the education department for questioning the move to assign its department officials and teachers for the verification exercise,

PATNA: Bihar Public Service Commission (BPSC) on Friday ticked off the the education department that questioned its decision to verify documents submitted by all candidates who applied for the teacher recruitment examination, saying it was not for the department officials to question or interfere in the internal processes of the state’s public service recruiter.

The Bihar Public Service Commission (BPSC) is in the middle of the process to recruit teachers (HT FILE PHOTO)

BPSC also hit back at the education department for questioning the move to assign its department officials and teachers for the verification exercise, underlining that this was a decision that was taken by the Bihar government, not the commission.

“If it is not clear to you, study the relevant articles of the Constitution. It should be clear that raising a question mark on the propriety of any internal process of the commission or attempt to put pressure is unconstitutional, unwarranted and unacceptable. It is surprising how the department, despite being aware, expects the commission to make recommendations (to select candidates) without document verification,” BPSC secretary Ravi Bhushan said in a letter to the secondary education department in Hindi.

BPSC added that “without verification, the commission can neither make any recommendation nor send any dossier”. “Which officer from which department is to be deployed is the prerogative of the government. If there is any objection or request should be made to the state government,” Bhushan wrote.

In a post on social media platform, X, earlier in the day, BPSC chairman Atul Prasad also appeared to be referring to the education department’s criticism. “Govt deputes its officers and changes later. It doesn’t concern us at all. But on this pretext, elements who tried to get our teachers recruitment - document verification cancelled should try harder,” he said in a post.

To be sure, Bihar chief secretary Amit Subhani has issued instructions to stop deployment of education department officials for the verification of documents related to teachers’ recruitment by BPSC.

The BPSC letter was a response the secondary education department’s missive on Tuesday that asked the commission to release all department officials and teachers deployed for verification of the documents.

“The engagement of education department officials and teachers is neither acceptable nor in the interest of education. As per the provisions under the rules, the verification of documents is to be done prior to issuing the appointment letters. Therefore, there is no logic of deploying officials and teachers for document verification in all the districts in contravention to the rules, without making recommendation of successful candidates,” the education department said.

BPSC responded that document verification was done in two phases - one at the level of commission prior to recommendation and another at the level of recruitment agency at the time of joining - and both have their relevance and complement each other.

Having conducted examination for recruitment of over 170,000 teachers last month, BPSC is carrying out verification of documents by organising camps in all the districts and the education department officials were deployed for the mammoth exercise.