KARACHI, March 1: Despite Sindh Education Minister Irfanullah Marwat's pledges that recruitment of primary and secondary teachers will be done purely on merit, an overwhelming majority of candidates believe that only those having money in their pockets will get government jobs.

Unfortunately, a majority of candidates is also willing to pay thousands of rupees to anyone who assures them that they will surely get the contractual jobs of primary or secondary school teachers.

Several others are extorting money from aspiring candidates for timely issuance of domicile and permanent residence certificates (PRCs) which were pre-requisite for the job.

Many candidates have started visiting the University of Karachi and degree colleges for obtaining their BA, MA and other degrees required for the jobs while several "con artists" are attracting people by assuring them that they can arrange "fake degrees having record in KU exams department."

Several candidates, who have applied for primary and secondary school teachers job, confirmed that they had paid Rs25,000 to Rs35,000 to certain government officials, political activists and those posing themselves as front-men of some provincial ministers.

One of such candidates said, "I came to know that a clerk in education department, is assuring people of granting jobs on payment of Rs70,000. I gave him half of the money and it was agreed that the rest will be given to him after confirmation of the job." He claimed that he was also aware of several other candidates who had paid money to the said person.

Several other people told this scribe that they were willing to pay Rs50,000 to Rs60,000 to any "reliable" person for jobs in the education department. They said the recruitment of lecturers clearly indicated that they would have to feed the concerned officials for getting the jobs.

The education department had recently announced recruitment of over 12,000 primary and secondary school teachers on three-year contract, for which over 200,000 candidates have already applied and it is expected that similar number of candidates will also apply within the next few days.

It is worth mentioning here that Sindh Education Minister Irfanullah Marwat on a number of occasions has clarified that the process of recruitment in the department will be "fair, transparent and according to the rules and regulations". -PPI