The case of illegal candidate selection in the recruitment of Junior Engineer (Civil) positions in the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) has now reached the High Court, which issued a returnable notice to the civic body on February 28.
It has been alleged in a petition filed in the Bombay High Court by Adv Asim Sarode, Adv Trunal Tonpe and Adv Abhijit Ghule Patil for the petitioner Kiran Pawar that candidates on the waiting list have been treated unfairly. It is alleged that many candidates, who submitted fake three-year experience, have been selected by the PMC.
On February 28, acting chief justice S V Gangapurwala and justice Sandeep Marne bench issued a notice to the respondent PMC, the Government of Maharashtra, and those who obtained jobs through unfair means.
PMC was represented by Adv Abhijit Kulkarni, Adv Aditya Mahadik, Adv Sweta Shah, and Adv Krushna Jaybhay, while the state government was represented by Advocate PP Kakade, Government Pleader (GP), and Adv RA Salunkhe, AGP.
The PMC has finished the recruitment process for the positions of a clerk, junior engineer, assistant legal officer, and assistant anti-encroachment officer, and the examination was held online through the organisation ‘IBPS’. Following that, the civic body’s staff selection committee directed the document verification committee to consider three years experience certificate along with Form 16, a pay slip, and a bank statement showing three years of experience when selecting suitable candidates for the post of junior engineer.
{{/usCountry}}The PMC has finished the recruitment process for the positions of a clerk, junior engineer, assistant legal officer, and assistant anti-encroachment officer, and the examination was held online through the organisation ‘IBPS’. Following that, the civic body’s staff selection committee directed the document verification committee to consider three years experience certificate along with Form 16, a pay slip, and a bank statement showing three years of experience when selecting suitable candidates for the post of junior engineer.
{{/usCountry}}Candidates on the merit list were called for document verification in the order of their marks. It released the final list of candidates for 135 seats. However, many candidates provided cash vouchers as proof of salary and were accepted by the civic body. It was not included in PMC’s list of 11 documents, and candidates on the waiting list were not considered despite having most of the 11 documents.
Now, those on the waiting list have claimed that there has been a lot of corruption in this illegal recruitment process and that the PMC’s management has done injustice to the honest candidates.
According to Adv Asim Sarode, many PMC projects lack transparency and should be investigated by a third-party organisation.
“ I am on the waitlist for the position of Junior Engineer (Civil). However, many candidates provided forged experience certificates. My objection is that the PMC has accepted a cash voucher as a substitute for a payslip. As a result, I filed a petition in the Bombay High Court, believing that not only I but other victims of injustice, would receive justice through the court,” said petitioner Kiran Pawar.