Hyderabad: The creation of new districts in Telangana state has made determination of local/non-local status of job applicants, a complex issue. Old districts were reorganised last year to create two or three new districts from each old district.
With this, candidates who completed schooling in old districts have now come under the jurisdiction of new districts.
Four years of schooling from Class IV to X is being considered to accord local status in a particular district in line with Presidential Order since 1974.
With changes in jurisdiction of districts now, candidates are worried about where they will get local status. With the state government lining up a series of job notifications to fill thousands of vacancies in various departments within a year, the local/ non-local issue has become a matter of serious concern for job applicants.
The issue flared up when the Teacher Recruitment Test (TRT) notification was issued two days ago to fill around 8,700 vacancies. The recruitment is being done by taking the district as the unit. But this means that thousands of candidates who completed schooling in the old districts and are now falling under the jurisdiction of the new districts have lost their local status in the old districts.
The TRT rules state that 80 per cent of jobs in each district are reserved for locals. However, peculiar problems are coming to light with job seekers thronging education department offices in all districts to seek clarity over which district they belong to. One such case is that of P. Bhushan, who belonged to the old Adilabad district. The district has now been divided into four districts, namely Adilabad, Asifabad, Mancherial and Nirmal districts.
He studied in Class IV and V in Adilabad, Class VI to VIII in Mancherial and Class IX and X in Asifabad, as his father was constantly transferred. Bhushan is not sure in which district he has local status as has not done his schooling for four years in any one district.
Another case in point is D. Srilaxmi, who belonged to the old Warangal district, which was reorganised into five districts - Warangal urban, Warangal rural, Jangoan, Bhupalapally and Mahbubabad.
She studied in Class IV in Mahbubabad, Class V to VI in Bhupalapally, Class VII, VIII in Mahbubabad and Class IX and X in Warangal town. She is confused about which district she is considered a local of as she does not meet the four-year schooling requirement in any district.
As a result of this, anxious candidates are vying for the 20 per cent non-local posts in all districts. This has resulted in a huge rush for the 20 per cent non-local posts. The government is yet to address these issues. Deputy Chief Minister and education minister Kadiam Srihari said, “We will soon issue guidelines to officials on determining local status of candidates. Such complaints have come to our notice. District education officials have been asked to receive complaints from such students, which will be inquired to determine their local status.”
However, official sources said that in this type of case, the government is planning to accord 'local status' of the district in which the student did the last two classes, that is, Class IX and X.
If a student has just done Class X in a particular district, then the district in which he has studied in the preceding three years will be treated as the local district.
Officials are aware that this may invite litigation if there is no clearer and more concrete policy by the government on what determines local status.
