NRA: A welcome decision

The decision of the Union Government to set up a National Recruitment Agency (NRA) for the appointment of the non-gazetted government, railway, and bank employees is a welcome decision. In fact, such a decision should have been taken long ago, but better late than never, the Modi government deserves credit for implementing such a bold decision offering solace to millions of aspiring youth.

 

Those aspiring for a government job have to go through various qualifying pre-recruitment examinations at different levels. The fees for various boards is another burden for the aspirants. Since there is a lack of coordination between these recruitment boards, the examination dates clash creating headaches and anxiety for the aspirant candidates. Often, they lose their money, time, and opportunity and suffer for the rest of their life.

 

Now, with the establishment of the NRA, this injustice would end and the aspiring youths would get an equal chance to chart their future course for the better. Thus, the decision of the Centre is most welcome from this point of view.

 

 

At present, there are some twenty organizations that conduct various recruitment examinations for central government offices, secretariat, railway, public sector banks, and other establishments to select the deserving candidates. The NRA would eliminate all these processes and a common examination would be held henceforth for shortlisting deserving and qualified candidates according to their merit. After the initial selection, the candidates will have to appear for a second examination of the concerned department.

 

This decision will definitely benefit the crores of youths seeking government jobs. This common examination will be conducted in 12 languages and the merit list prepared will be considered for a period of three years. This is another important aspect of this scheme. Each candidate can avail three chances to improve his/her standard and the best score of the three examinations will be considered. Thus, there will be no injustice done and each one will get the proper justice in terms of jobs.

 

The process of common test and the departmental test will be transparent and will not have any chance for corruption at any level. This may be described as one of the special features of the new scheme. At present also the qualifying exams are conducted in a most transparent manner but at the later stage of actually obtaining a job, corruption is involved. Touts and agents are always on the lookout for such ‘scapegoats’ who aspire for early appointments and get trapped in their cobwebs. The common man has lost his faith in the system and therefore tempts to get the jobs through such ‘shortcuts’. With the NRA such accidents can be averted.

 

The Centre has given a detailed thought before initiating this new scheme. It appears that the government has given special consideration to the rural areas and decided to conduct this common test at around 1000 centers across the country. Thus, candidates from rural or remote areas will not have to spend much on traveling. Each district will have a center where such tests would be conducted. This will benefit the economically weaker sections, Divyangs, women candidates as they can appear for the tests in their district only.

 

This NRA will end confusion in the recruitment process. Those who secure good marks will be selected as per the merit and this is most justifiable. The government can initiate some more steps such as setting up a pre-examination guidance center in each district to provide guidance to the aspiring candidates. The candidates should be given training regarding the nature of the exam, syllabus, types of questions and scope of the syllabus, etc. so that they get a fair chance to compete with others coming from a better environment.

 

Cities like Mumbai, Pune, Delhi, Chennai, Bengaluru, etc. have all facilities as compared to the backward districts and remote and tribal areas. The candidates coming from these regions do not have any approach to such facilities and therefore, lack of quality and competition. Taking a serious view of this disparity, the government must ponder over the idea of setting up a training center at each district and provide study material free of cost to ensure free and fair chances to all. That would ensure the success of this scheme.