Bhubaneswar: Orissa High Court has directed the Odisha government to refrain from conducting the final selection process and appointment of junior teachers until next hearing.
The single-judge bench granted permission for the document verification process scheduled for January 20 and January 21, 2024 to continue.
The court order stated, “Since basing on the impugned draft result sheet, verification of documents has been fixed to 20th and 21st of this month, let the process with regard to verification of the documents may continue on the date fixed, but no final decision be taken with regard to final selection and appointment till January 24, 2024.”
After publication of the draft merit list of the recruitment drive many aspirants alleged irregularities and protested outside the office of the Odisha School Education Programme Authority (OSEPA) in Bhubaneswar. They expressed discontent over not releasing the cut-off marks before the merit list.
One of the protestors claimed that successful candidates’ categorisation into SC, ST and Unreserved remained unclear. Several examinees with higher scores had not been placed on the merit list, he added.
OSEPA director Anupam Shah defended the recruitment process, stating that a draft merit list of 18,805 candidates was published following objections to the answer keys. He assured that the evaluation, based on CBT scores, adhered to the normal process, rejecting claims of irregularities in the test.
PNN