Police on Friday used force to disperse candidates protesting in Patna over the delay in the release of the fourth phase teacher recruitment notification by the Bihar Public Service Commission. Let’s understand the whole matter in detail.
The protest was organised to demand the release of the Teacher Recruitment Examination (TRE)-4 notification. A large number of teaching job aspirants marched from Patna College towards the BPSC office in the morning. Police had placed barricades near J P Golambar in the Gandhi Maidan police station area to stop the procession.
According to the protesters, they were stopped for nearly two hours from around 11:30 am. The situation later turned tense after some demonstrators allegedly tried to break the barricades. Police then carried out a lathicharge to control the crowd. Several students, including women candidates, were injured during the police action.
Student leader Dilip Kumar accused the BPSC of repeatedly delaying the recruitment process and misleading candidates. He claimed that more than 13 lakh aspirants are waiting for the notification.
He said the commission had earlier announced that the notification would be released on April 19 and applications would start from April 25 or 26. However, even by May 8, the notification had not been issued, which forced candidates to protest. Police detained several protesters and took them away in police vans after clashes broke out.
The incident triggered political reactions across Bihar. Leader of Opposition Tejashwi Yadav criticised the NDA government and alleged that unemployed youth demanding jobs were being beaten with lathis, while leaders were giving ministerial posts to their own children.
In a post on X, Tejashwi Yadav said NDA leaders had promised to release TRE-4 vacancies before the elections, but even after six months of forming the government, the notification had not been issued. He called the incident a betrayal of Bihar’s youth.
Rajesh Ram also criticised the police action and said it showed the “real face” of the BJP-led government in Bihar. The Bihar Congress accused the government of rewarding leaders’ families while using force against unemployed youth.
TRE-4 is expected to fill thousands of teaching vacancies in Bihar. The recruitment will include posts in the Education Department, Backward and Extremely Backward Classes Welfare Department, Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe Welfare Department, and Minority Welfare Department.
The Education Department alone is expected to have 9,082 vacancies for classes 9 and 10, and 16,774 vacancies for classes 11 and 12. In addition, around 10,778 posts are expected at the primary level and 8,583 at the middle school level. Some reports during the protest suggested that the total number of vacancies could be around 46,000.
Candidates said recruitment approval had already been granted earlier this year, but the official notification is still pending. The examination is expected to be held between September 22 and 27, but the delay in releasing the advertisement has increased uncertainty among aspirants.
