Powercom jobs go unfilled
Declaring the vacancy of 608 posts, the authorities concerned found only 73 of them deserving
DP correspondent

Bathinda

A government job with handsome salary and reputed post would be the dream of majority of youngsters but the recently declared results for the selection of engineers in state power sector has exposed not only the poor performance of thousands of applicants but also raised a big question mark on the standards of technical education prevailing here.

Declaring the vacancy of 608 posts of engineers at assistant and junior level in different streams, the Punjab State Power Corporation Limited (PSPCL) recently conducted written test, which was taken by thousands of applicants.

However, going through their performance, the authorities concerned found only 73 of them deserving to be called for the document checking. As per the notification number CRA No-276/2012, the department required applicants with full time regular BE/B.Tech/B.Sc. (Engineering) having a minimum of 60 per cent marks or equivalent degree recognized by AICTE or AMIE with the same percentage of marks from Institution of Engineers (India) Calcutta under different streams. They were assured that the selected ones would get a salary scale of Rs 16650-39100 + Rs 5800 as Grade Pay.

However, against the 290 posts of AE (OT)/ Electrical, the department could get only three eligible candidates to be called for further proceedings after the written test. Electrical was not the only stream, Mechanical, Instrumentation and Control, Electronics and Communication were among others, where too department failed to fill the vacancies.

Further, in the categories of Junior Engineer, Auxiliary Plant Attendant, Assistant Junior Specialist, etc, the department had called the candidates announcing the salary scale as Rs 10900- 34800 + Rs 4350 Grade Pay but there too against the vacancy of 260 only 45 candidates could be shortlisted for further screening.

Finding the gap between the selected and required engineers, the PSPCL has now left with no other option than to call for the applications once again to conduct yet another test.

As per the information provided by an RTI activist Ranjiv Goyal of Rampura, there are around 125 engineering colleges and almost the same number of poly technical colleges operating in the state. Besides, he mentioned the functioning of half a dozen technical education universities, which all boasts enough of giving the state thousands of engineers every year.

Under such big claims, the compulsion of re-conducting the tests for failing to get even 600 eligible engineers in one go has put all including the PSPCL officials and authorities of the technical education department in worry.