The competitive exam for Provincial Management Services (PMS) conducted by the PPSC has become so uncertain, unreliable and non-transparent that the student community has become frustrated and disillusioned.
There is no certainty about when the exam will be conducted or whether it will be conducted at all. The last PMS exam was held in 2009, after an interval of three years. It was again scheduled to be held in June 2011 but the Lahore High Court ordered its postponement due to the issue of age relaxation only a week before the exam. Could the Honourable Court not have decided the simple issue of age relaxation in a couple of hearings instead of prolonging it for six months?
Had the Honourable judges been unemployed like me, they could understand my point. Now the PPSC has announced the exam to be held in the coming June. However, I have come to know that another writ for age relaxation has been filed in the LHC. Will the court again order postponement of the exam for another year? It is also being rumoured that PPSC will be unable to arrange examination centres in the next two months. Hence, the exam is likely to be delayed till August.
As an aspirant of the civil service, I came to Lahore in 2009. I have not appeared in a single PMS exam, because none has been conducted since then. My father is now calling me back to my village because he is now unable to finance my studies. Whom should I blame? The PPSC? The court? Or machinations of the powerful District Management Group against the provincial service to preserve their own turf? Or my fate?
There are also allegations of corruption in the conducting of competitive exams by PPSC. A writ against alleged leaking of question paper before the exam for the post of Assistant Director Land Records is already pending in the LHC. I request the PPSC to clear the dust by announcing a definite date. In case of further postponement, I and hundred others like me would suffer. The credibility of PPSC can only be restored by transparently conducting the exam on the scheduled time.
MUKHTAR AHMAD
Lahore