Kerala govt institutions make 25,000 recruitments a year bypassing employment exchange

Thiruvananthapuram: About 25,000 appointments have been made in various government and public sector undertakings this year bypassing the employment exchange. 

The establishments that bypassed the employment exchange are the department of general education, health, local self-government, water authority and KSRTC. The government’s decision to hand over the recruitment of guest teachers in schools to employment exchange also did not see fruition. As many as 11,200 temporary appointments were made this academic year.

The government dictates that temporary appointments in government institutions should be made through the employment exchange, following the criteria, including reservation and priority. However, most of the institutions conduct direct recruitment even if it is not legal due to certain interferences and vested interests. Some of the posts even draw a salary of up to Rs 1 lakh.

Many public sector undertakings including KSRTC have been seeking the help of the Center for Management Development (CMD) for recruitment for over ten years now. Although the government has clarified that CMD, a government-sector consulting firm, does not hold the authority to make recruitments, such appointments continue unabated. This is a paid service while the services of the employment exchange are free of cost.

However, employment exchanges provide employment for 30,000 people annually in both the government and the private sectors. In 2022, as many as 2,807 permanent appointments and 11,625 temporary appointments were made in government institutions. As many as 10,000 recruitments were done in private companies through job fairs and 5,000 through self-employment initiatives.