SI recruitment
By Our Special Correspondent
Shillong: It’s unheard of that any recruitment examination in Meghalaya is conducted with utmost transparency and is devoid of manipulation. This time senior officers of the Police say, the question papers were set in a manner that 250 marks were allotted for the written examination and 50 for the personal interview.
“This system is to ensure that no one throws their weight behind any candidate. It will also prevent undeserving persons to get into the police force,” police sources said adding that this has the backing of the Chief Minister himself who has been mooting the idea of a transparent recruitment process in public forums.
Highly placed police sources said 15 senior officers were handpicked to evaluate the papers under strict supervision. The process was completed within 48 hours and the results of the written test were immediately uploaded to the police website.
All stages of the recruitment process were video-graphed, including the personal interviews. Also the process followed was more advanced this time. Those on the interview board were told to independently assess the other attributes of a candidate through more nuanced questioning and to mark each candidate on a scale of 1-10.
“Through this transformative process we want to get the best candidate into the police force. This will benefit the State. We also want to restore the faith of youth in the police force,” said a high ranking police official.
The results of the personal interview which had been going on until March 31, were uploaded in the police website at 9 pm on Sunday. Police sources say that this quick publication of results has ruled out any political and other interference, although it has not gone down too well with some bigwigs.
Only after the results are uploaded into the website are the files sent to the respective department for information and endorsement.
There were nearly 3000 applicants for 117 posts of Sub Inspector. Of this number about 1450 passed the physical test, and only 351 passed their written examination.
Police sources said, “This time we have been able to withstand all kinds of pressure because the top man leading the Police Organisation is squeaky clean. “Meghalaya DGP, Ramchandran is known for his honesty and transparency and has revolutionised the organisation during his short tenure,” the sources observed.
Meanwhile, talking to The Shillong Times, Ramchandran who is presently in Delhi said, “Next month we will be recruiting 1800 constables, and the same transparent procedure will be followed. Now we already have a good model in place.”
Chief Minister Dr Mukul Sangma had suggested to the Police Department to carry out a psychological profiling of each candidate to test if he/she has what it takes to make a good policeman.
Earlier while talking to this scribe, Dr Sangma had lamented at the quality of the police personnel in Meghalaya which easily succumbs to extortion, violence and other vices, thereby rendering them counter-productive. DGP Ramchandran said this profiling is a revolutionary model requiring more testing and consultation with other states and countries which have developed best practices in police recruitment.
An activist however, commented that for a long time Meghalaya Police had no leadership. Honesty and transparency were not part of police vocabulary. There was also a lot of infighting in the force, including among top officials. Ramchandran’s advent to Shillong has changed things considerably.