InDepth | With the Jharkhand protest at a crossroads, what happens next is crucial

On the morning of August 19, Hariram, who is in his 50s, went to his office as usual. However, something unusual happened. He was stopped at the gate. No explanation was given. Hariram probably saw this coming. Or not.

Two days ago, on August 17, Hemant Soren, the chief minister of Jharkhand, announced the cancellation of the Jharkhand Staff Selection Commission Combined Graduate Level (JSSC-CGL) exam, following student protests over alleged recruitment irregularities.

Hariram, who did odd jobs for survival for years while preparing for competitive exams that would fetch him a government job, eventually cracked the JSSC—held to recruit graduates for administrative and non-technical jobs. After joining the government job, the father of two children aged 18 and 15 thought he had managed to secure his family’s future. But the cancellation has put a question mark on his recruitment. And his future. Age, after all, is not on his side.

A few kilometres away, at Jaipal Singh Munda Stadium in Ranchi, people protesting against alleged irregularities and corruption in recruitment exams since July 25 celebrated the same decision that had locked out Hariram and many others like him. Among thousands gathered, there was Piyush Kumar. The son of a farmer who had spent years failing exams that he now believes were never clean says he feels for the genuine candidates whose recruitments were cancelled but adds that the scale of alleged malpractices made the line between merit and manipulation blur.

Two sets of people. Two scenarios. One genuine question: in case of malpractices in exams, can the state punish those responsible without punishing the candidates who may have cleared it fairly?

After cancelling the JSSC, the government, on August 18, cancelled 22 recruitment exams/processes, suspended six pending investigations and referred 17 older Jharkhand Public Service Com­mi­ssion (JPSC) recruitments for a Crime Investigation Department (CID) probe. The government’s decision aff­ects 45 recruitment processes. For those who had built their lives around appointment and recruitment, it came as a shock.

“We were stopped at our office gate. We were a part of this system. Suddenly, we have become outsiders. How could the government take such a decision? If one side is screaming injustice, they should listen to our side as well,” says Ashish Ekka, an assistant section officer.

Dharmendra Kumar, another employee, says: “If the government ordered a CID probe, why were our appointments cancelled before the investigation was completed? Investigate us. We are ready to cooperate with the agency.”

The Value of a Job

The frustration is built into the numbers. More than three lakh candidates registered for 510 posts of the JSSC field-worker recruitment exercise in July—for every vacancy, there were roughly 633 registered candidates. This is the arithmetic behind Hariram’s years of preparation as well as behind the frustration that built the protest.

“We kept filling forms after forms and appeared for exams after exams, but in this corrupt system, our efforts were going to waste,” says Ravindra Paswan, a prominent voice in the JPSC-JSSC Reform Manch. Kumar, who appeared in multiple exams, says initially he believed repeated failures reflected shortcomings in his own preparation. As he encountered more allegations of irregularities, he began to see the problem as systemic rather than personal. The movement brought together aspirants like him who had been fighting individual battles and gave them a shared platform.

On August 10, protesters marching toward the Assembly were stopped by the police. The confrontation escalated. The movement announced a gherao of the chief minister’s residence on August 20. Political pressure grew alongside it, including outreach by Rahul Gandhi and meetings between Congress leaders and Soren. No resolution emerged.

System Reset

After a marathon Cabinet meeting, the government cancelled the JSSC-CGL examination, its result and the entire selection process. The action went further with the government cancelling 22 other exams and roping in the CID.

The government also announced measures to rebuild the system. Seeking the Jharkhand High Court’s intervention for a fast-track court for cases relating to exam irregularities, an internal vigilance mechanism and an exam-reform committee headed by senior IAS officer Amitabh Kaushal are some of the steps announced by the government.

But was the blanket cancellation the right move?

While Anurag Dave of the Department of Journalism and Mass Communication at Banaras Hindu University feels the government should protect the interests of the fairly selected candidates, Alok Kumar Gupta, Head of the Department of Political Science and Public Administration at the Central University of Jharkhand, says rather than cancelling the exam, the government should have promised transparency, timely execution of the recruitment process and ordered a CBI probe. “Strong action should be taken against the culprits as well as candidates who obtained posts through unfair means,” he adds, while pointing out the underlying pressure that is driving the stakes this high—roughly 65 per cent of India’s population is in the working-age group, but there are not enough jobs. The cut-throat competition for government jobs is a result of that.

The Reform Manch has its own prescription for what comes next: ending the outsourcing of competitive exams to private agencies, keeping politically motivated individuals out of commission chairmanships and introducing a pre-announced recruitment and examination calendar that is strictly followed.

Paswan says the protesters have serious doubts about whether the CID investigation will restore people’s faith in the system. The Reform Manch has separately called for the Enforcement Directorate to examine alleged financial transactions.

The disagreement, in the end, is not only about whether an investigation should happen. It is also about who investigates, whether individual responsibility gets established rather than assumed and whether either side will trust the findings.

The 60-day Test

On August 19, the Reform Manch announced a 60-day suspension of its agitation, saying it would monitor the implementation of the measures announced and resume the protest if its remaining demands went unmet.

For the government, these 60 days are an opportunity to prove that the cancellation was the beginning of a credible reconstruction of the recruitment system, not just a response to street pressure. For the protesting aspirants, the 60-day window will determine whether the promised reforms are real. For the selected candidates like Hariram, Ekka and Kumar, the next 60 days may determine whether their appointments are reviewed and restored or whether they will simply stay locked out of their offices.

For now, there is a twist in the tale. After the successful candidates moved the Jharkhand High Court fearing job loss, the court, on August 21, stayed the exam cancellation. The next day, protesters accused the Jharkhand government of “betraying” them by failing to properly defend in court its decision to cancel several recruitment exams, their key demand. Clashes followed.

The Bharatiya Janata Party extended its support to the protesters and accused Congress leader Rahul Gandhi of showcasing a “duplicitous attitude” over students’ welfare. The Soren government, on the other hand, alleged the BJP was using students to further its political interests. The next few days are crucial.

Shashi Singh is a Jharkhand-based author and journalist