Alleging irregularities in the recruitment of ration shop salesmen and packers for the shops in Tenkasi district, the Bharatiya Janata Party has appealed to the District Collector to conduct thorough inquiry into this serious issue and come-out with a white paper on his findings.

In a statement, Tenkasi district president of BJP Ananthan Ayyasamy said he had received complaints from the job aspirants and information from the public including the DMK functionaries that the ration shop workers recruitment was not done as per the norms stipulated by the Department of Cooperation. When the allegations were cross-checked with the sources in the Department of Cooperation, job aspirants and the selected candidates, it was found that the applicants who had scored low marks had been selected for the jobs of salesmen and packers.

Even though the announcement for recruitment of salesmen and the packers for ration shops being run by the Department of Cooperation said 40 salesmen and 11 packers (51 vacancies) would be recruited, the number of vacancies were increased midway to 66 – 52 salesmen and 14 packers. The reason behind increasing the number of vacancies was not made public.

As per the norms, the candidates’ marks in Plus Two and SSLC and the marks they obtained in the personal interview would be considered for selection apart from the communal roaster as per reservation policies.

“While the candidates who have scored more than 1,000 marks have not found the place in the selection list, those who had obtained 950 have been selected. Private interaction with a few selected candidates has revealed that these appointments had been made by flouting the norms for hefty bribe. Hence, the District Collector should personally conduct an inquiry and release white paper on the recruitment of ration shop workers,” said Mr. Ananthan.