ISLAMABAD - Seeking employment in public sector institutions is fast becoming a sorry state of affair. It has become difficult especially after the government introduced the National Testing Service (NTS) to make it a merit based process. But feedback coming from the applicants suggests that this system is not working well either and rather it is promoting corruption and nepotism.
According to Raja Niaz, a retired government official in Islamabad, his son had applied for a job in more than five government departments but did not receive any call. “A poor man like me had spent more than Rs6,000 for submitting applications for these jobs and still there is no response,” he lamented.
He said that he was more disappointed when he learnt that the people who had not followed the laid down procedure to apply for these jobs have been selected and those who followed the process have been dropped.
“All the departments his son had applied for employment dropped him and appointed only those who had any reference,” he claimed. He went on to say that despite being a low category employee, he had invested for the education of his son but to no use.
There are many other people like Raja Niaz who made such complaint. “It would have been much better to spend that money on setting up a small shop for my children instead of wasting it on their education,” said Shafqat Shah, a driver in a private school, who went through the process to get employment for children in government institutions. These are the two cases relating to seeking employment in government departments for petty jobs like clerks and drivers.
Interestingly, the same is the situation for professionals such as doctors and engineers who are hired in the government departments directly and not through the Federal Public Service Commission. “My daughter, a professional engineer, had applied in a defence related institution and despite completing the entire process of security clearance she is waiting for an appointment letter even after 18 months,” said an aggrieved father requesting not to be named because of the sensitivity relating to the job her daughter has applied for.
He noted with concern that whenever he tried to seek update about the status of her daughter he was discouraged to contact the department and he is still waiting in good hope.
He demanded a fool proof system of transparency especially for recruitment of young talent in the defence related institutions.
Some other people also had similar complaints and demanded merit-based recruitment system in the government institutions. Otherwise, this trend, if continued unabated, would lead to more brain drain of educated young and professionals from the country. Also, this tendency, if not checked, would cause social injustice and unrest among the citizens if they were denied their right to employment for their children in the government institutions after they spent a huge sum on their education.