Editor,
I am writing this letter to the chairman of the APPSC with great disappointment and anguish over the recent amendment to the eligibility criteria for the FAO/STO recruitment.
By amending the criteria, the commission has now made graduates from other disciplines, including engineering and even general arts graduates with subjects such as political science or sociology, eligible for said posts if they have studied basic economics, mathematics or related subjects in any of their semesters. The problem with this is that basic economics, mathematics or statistics is taught as a subject in many different disciplines, often only for one or two semesters. This, in my opinion, defeats the very purpose of having a technical recruitment for FAO/STO and is unfair to graduates of commerce, economics and statistics who have spent years studying and specialising in these subjects.
Further, the preliminary examination syllabus itself appears to give an advantage to candidates from mathematics and engineering backgrounds. If the commission has considered representations from candidates regarding the eligibility criteria mentioned in the previous advertisement, it should also take into account that the previous recruitment test syllabus was different and was more in line with the technical nature of the posts. The present structure, therefore, cannot be viewed separately from the change in eligibility.
Nonetheless, what bothers me most is not simply the amendment to the eligibility criteria, but the way the entire recruitment examination has been framed. Opening a technical post to candidates from a much wider range of disciplines while simultaneously having a preliminary paper heavily centred around commercial mathematics naturally puts candidates with a strong mathematics background at an advantage.
There is also a growing concern among many aspirants about whether opportunities under the commission are being distributed fairly among different academic disciplines. The number of advertisements, the number of vacancies, the marks obtained in optional subjects in APSCCCE 2024, and now the changes in the FAO/STO eligibility criteria and syllabus have all contributed to this perception. I am not saying that these things, individually, prove favouritism. But taken together, they certainly raise questions that the commission should address.
For commerce, economics and statistics graduates, posts such as FAO and STO are among the few government opportunities that are directly connected to the subjects they have spent years studying. When the eligibility for such posts is broadened to include almost anyone who has had a basic paper in statistics or mathematics, it becomes difficult for those candidates to understand what advantage their years of specialisation are supposed to give them.
More importantly, when the screening examination itself does not test the specialised subjects they have studied in depth, it becomes difficult to see how their years of specialisation are being given due consideration in the selection process.
The commission should therefore reconsider both the eligibility criteria and the preliminary examination syllabus and ensure that they are consistent with the technical nature of the posts.
Candidates from other disciplines should certainly have a fair opportunity where their qualifications are relevant, but fairness should work both ways. It should not mean that the few specialised opportunities available to commerce, economics and statistics graduates are also diluted.
The commission is expected to maintain fairness and equal opportunity in recruitment. It should therefore ensure that its decisions are not influenced, even inadvertently, by a preference towards any particular academic discipline.
A concerned candidate
