KARACHI, May 1: There is a resentment among successful candidates of the Central Superior Services (CSS) examination batch 2001-2002 over reports that four of their seats from Urban quota are being allocated to the candidates who had qualified in the batch of 1999-2000 but were denied seats for want of domicile merit.
Terming it an injustice with the successful batch of 2001-2002 from Sindh (Urban), they appealed to the President and the Prime Minister to take notice of it and act to safeguard their rights by allocating due share on the basis of recent census figures.
They told Dawn that although the final merit list was announced on Sept 21, 2002, the allocations had not been made causing uncertainty among the 150-160 candidates on merits.
The reason given by the FPSC for this delay was a case pending in the apex court filed by eight candidates of the 1999-2000 batch.
However, it is learnt that the FPSC had made allocation reportedly to four out of eight candidates provisionally from the seats of the batch 2001 and 2002 and the remaining four likely to be accommodated from the next year’s batch.
Under the FPSC rules, allocations to the qualified candidates are awarded on the basis of domicile of the father of the candidates.
According to the candidates, the FPSC has decided under influence to reduce four seats from the Sindh (Urban) candidates to facilitate the above four candidates.
Each of these four candidates has a Sindh (Urban) domicile but their father’s domicile is not of Sindh (Urban) as such under the FPSC rules they do not come on the merit criteria of Sindh (Urban).
Their accommodation from the Sindh (Urban) will be a gross injustice to the valid candidates originating from this region, and it will set a precedent, whereby it will open Sindh (Urban) seats to candidates of any of the batch of FPSC examination, not to mention the year-end cycle of suits and litigations that FPSC will have to deal with, they pointed out.
Sindh (Urban) is already not given its due share of seats, it has a quota of 7.6 per cent. Although the population of Karachi was 14 million, making it 10 per cent of Pakistan’s 140 million, they recalled and said under the current circumstances if the candidates of Sindh (Urban) were deprived of a further four seats, it would be a travesty of justice and a violation of the constitutional rights.
They have appealed to the president and prime minister of Pakistan to take notice and rectify the situation before it degenerates further.
