Editor,

I wish to draw the urgent attention of the Arunachal Pradesh Public Service Commission (APPSC) and the higher education authorities to a critical malpractice occurring during the screening process for assistant professor recruitments.

The recruitment process heavily relies on the Academic Performance Indicator (API) score system mandated by the UGC Regulations, 2018. Candidates receive up to 10 marks for teaching experience, calculated at 2 marks per completed year.

However, this points allocation has given rise to a highly unfair practice. Many candidates who were registered as regular, full-time PhD scholars engaged in unauthorised, concurrent teaching jobs. They are now submitting these parallel experience certificates to artificially inflate their screening scores. This directly violates UGC guidelines.

This loophole severely disadvantages honest scholars who respected academic integrity and focused entirely on their research. Because the APPSC strictly shortlists candidates for the personal interview in a narrow 1:3 ratio, rule-abiding scholars with high-quality research are being pushed out of the interview zone by candidates carrying illegal, overlapping experience points.

Therefore, I earnestly request the APPSC scrutiny and document verification committees to strictly cross-check the timelines of all submitted documents. The commission must match the exact dates of a candidate’s full-time PhD registration against the dates on their teaching experience certificates.

Concerned aspirant