Mamata sacks all railway recruitment board heads

NEW DELHI: The drastic decision to revamp the recruitment process has come at a time when RRBs, located in 20 cities across the country, are mired in controversy and accusations of largescale corruption, irregularities and question paper leak. Recently incidents of paper leak were reported from RRBs in Allahabad and Ajmer.

"The minister has appointed new chairmen for all RRBs," said a senior railway official. The post of chairman is occupied by senior railway officials with tenure of three years.

Railway ministry sources said most chairmen were appointed during Lalu's tenure and a majority of them were yet to complete their terms.

The "surgical exercise" is not only aimed at streamlining the recruitment process, making it corruption free, but also to ensure that local people get representation. Generally, RRBs were assigned responsibility of carrying out recruitment of Group C and Group D staff for vacancies in divisions and zones allocated to them.

While Mamata had already announced conducting railway recruitment exams in Urdu, sources said the recruitment was likely to be held in other local languages too to help local youth gets jobs. Railway examinations till now were conducted in English and Hindi only.

"The minister wants to revamp the entire recruitment process," said a senior official in Railway Board.

Under the revamp exercise, the ministry is set to announce benefits for minority women and those belonging to economically backward classes. Railways is also working to remove the requirement to attach postal orders along with railway recruitment forms for minority community women and economically backward classes, an official said.

Also, recruitment examinations would be held on the same day throughout the country to benefit people from all states.

The review proposal came after largescale violence in Mumbai and other centres and disruptions by local politicians alleging that most of the candidates appearing for RRB exams were from outside the state.

"The motive is to ensure representation of local people and to hold corruption-free RRB exams," said an official.
In yet another blow to her predecessor Lalu Prasad's legacy, railway minister Mamata Banerjee has removed the chairmen of all railway

recruitment boards (RRBs).