Jammu : National Panthers Party chief Harsh Dev Singh on Saturday torched a government’s “effigy” to protest against the new recruitment rules here, terming a recent notification on the issue a “cruel joke” with educated unemployed youth of Jammu and Kashmir.
Various political parties, including National Conference and Jammu and Kashmir Apni Party, too have opposed the new recruitment rules as “unjust for local residents” and “prejudicial in nature” and demanded its immediate rollback.
On June 04, the Union territory administration had notified special recruitment rules for filling up of vacant Class-IV posts in all departments and brought an end to the division and district specific recruitments. This practice will also be followed in respect of gazetted and non-gazetted posts in future.
Protesting against the new rules, Singh came out of his office and set ablaze an “effigy of the government” and sought modification of the new rules with repeal of SRO-202, a government order of 2015 under which the appointees in government service get only basic pay for the first five years of their service.
Describing the new rules as “unconstitutional and anti-youth”, he said denying the legitimate remuneration to appointed youths amounted to grave injustice besides the violation of the principle of “equal pay for equal work”.
Seeking the withdrawal of the SRO-202 and modification of new rules, Singh cautioned the government to refrain from testing the patience of the teeming unemployed of the UT.
National Conference provincial president Devender Singh Rana too has described the notification on recruitment rules for appointment to Class IV posts in Jammu and Kashmir as “unjust for the local residents” of the districts where these vacancies are to be filled, saying this would further shrink the scarce avenues of jobs for youths of the remote, backward and far-flung districts.
“Class IV posts from the lowest rung in the hierarchy of government sector with the lowest pay ranges and usurping these tantamount to denial of justice to youths and virtually snatching morsels of meals from the mouths of poor,” Rana had said in a statement.
Jammu and Kashmir Apni Party (JKAP) president Syed Mohammad Altaf Bukhari said the new recruitment rules for Class-IV jobs notified by the J&K government are completely “prejudicial in nature” and should be rolled back and modified in accordance with the standard rules governing the recruitment processes across the country.
“In the new recruitment rules, the administration has incorporated SRO-202 clauses which are not only obsolete but brazenly unconstitutional in nature. The five-year probation instead of two years with denial of increments is totally against the right to equality enjoyed by all other citizens across the country except for the residents of J&K,” Bukhari said.
The Jammu and Kashmir government, meanwhile, has referred to 7052 Class-IV vacancies to J&K Services Selection Board (JKSSB) under provisions of the Jammu and Kashmir Appointment to Class-IV (Special Recruitment) Rules, 2020.
As per a communiqué of General Administration Department, Accelerated Recruitment Committee, which was constituted on May 14, has identified and forwarded 7,052 vacancies of Class-IV posts of 19 departments to General Administration Department for their further referral to J&K Services Selection Board under rule 4 of the Jammu and Kashmir Appointment to Class-IV (Special Recruitment) Rules, 2020.
The vacancies with department-wise/cadre-wise/category-wise breakup are to be filled under provisions of the Jammu and Kashmir Appointment to Class-IV (Special Recruitment) 2020.
