Yet gain the government has extended the deadline for the work they themselves undertook by issuing an ordinance. It is indeed an ignominy that such a situation has been created by the ones who are supposed to rule the State. The government decided make recruitments through the Staff Selection Commission and also made the law for the same in 2019. It is 2023 and the government is yet to make recruitments through the Staff Selection Commission. To save themselves, the government has yet again amended the Goa Staff Commission Selection Act through an ordinance on 9th May, 2023.
As per the notification, the government departments which had published advertisements for recruitment before 8th January, 2022 are required to complete the tests and rest of the recruitment process before 31st August of this year. The government amending a law just to extend a deadline gives an impression that they do not want to recruit through Staff Selection Commission at least for now.
Secondly, the government through an ordinance had said that the concerned departments which had issued advertisements for filling the posts prior to 8th January 2022 may conduct examination and complete the selection process not later than one year from the date of commencement of the ordinance. This ordinance came into existence on 11th May, 2022 and its validity came to an end on 11th May, 2023. The government departments could not do any work during this period and since the government wanted to get the work done from these departments only, they have again extended the validity of the ordinance for another three months. If the government wanted to recruit through the government departments itself then why did they establish a commission under the Staff Selection Commission Act in the first place?
The government passed the Act in 2019 and amended it in 2021, 2022 and now again in 2023. These amendments have been done not to solve the problems but to cover the indiscipline and sloppy nature of work carried out by government departments. Of course, there may have been some difficulties but it was the departments’ responsibility to comply with the law. Why didn’t they do it? Or were they forced to do so by the government? Because when the Act was passed in 2019 the biggest question back then was how to suddenly give a break to the already ongoing recruitment process under various departments.
However, the government gave a nod to the Act in a hurried manner due to pressure from people and karyakartas. The reason behind passing such an Act was that the recruitment would be done in a neutral manner and administration would get rid of the pressure from people. On the other hand, there were also accusations that jobs were given in exchange of money and whether it is true or not, this also added pressure on those in the administration. Although the government passed the said Act, there was a catch. In 2016, the then government had banned the recruitment processes for posts in various government departments. The ban stayed till November 2020. This resulted in many posts staying vacant thus leading to interruption of work. The Staff Selection Commission Act may have been passed in 2019, but there was a delay in rules to be drafted under the Act and to install the required system in place.
The process of recruitment which the government intended to change in 2019 has not become a reality even though almost half of 2023 is over. What shall people make of this? If the government really had the will they could have completed the process there and then. However, the constant delay in implementing the said Act indicates lack of political willpower. The new deadline is now 31st August, 2023 which is for the advertisements issued before 8 January, 2022. This means that the government did not do anything from the beginning of last year till now. The government should continue with the current recruitment as it is for now but the recruitments henceforth should be done through Staff Selection Commission.
