The Department of Telecom has lifted its freeze over the recruitment of 2,700 junior engineers into Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd, India’s state-owned telecom operator.
The results of the recruitment exam, conducted in September last year, were put on hold in December after the Department of Telecom received complaints about the conduct of the exam from several sources, including some members of parliament.
The Department of Telecom has been going through the allegations for the last three months and has come to the conclusion that the exam and recruitment process is being carried out in a transparent way, according to BSNL sources.
“Recruitment of 2,700 officers has begun,” said an official. Candidates who were selected in the exam have been asked to submit their documents to the company for verification.
The initial date for completion of document verification was Dec 31.
Traditionally, BSNL’s JE or Junior Engineer exams were considered a secure and reliable way for a telecom or electronics engineer to begin his career.
However, with the company losing its market share to private players, its finances deteriorated. BSNL had not made any fresh recruitment of JEs for several years before the 2016 effort.
The exams had come under a cloud due to inconsistencies in process. Many candidates, for example, complained that many of the answer keys published by the company were wrong.
Meanwhile, BSNL has also announced that it will recruit 2,510 ‘junior telecom officer’ or JTOs this year.
Engineers who have taken the Graduate Aptitude Test exam conducted by the IITs can apply for the post. Recruitment will be done on the basis of GATE scores.