Why rush with jobs for poll rally victims: TN BJP chief Nainar

CHENNAI: BJP state president Nainar Nagenthran on Saturday accused Chief Minister C Joseph Vijay of showing urgency in providing government jobs to the families of those who died in the Karur election rally while failing to fill thousands of long-pending vacancies across government departments, saying lakhs of educated youth continued to wait for recruitment.

In a statement, Nainar Nagenthran said the BJP did not object to the government's decision to provide employment to the bereaved families on humanitarian grounds. However, he questioned why the same urgency was absent when it came to filling vacancies in education, healthcare and other public services.

"While lakhs of educated youngsters are striving day and night to secure government jobs, what answer does the Chief Minister have for them?" he asked.

Citing what he described as the State's mounting staffing crisis, the BJP leader claimed that 125 of the 181 government arts and science colleges were functioning without principals and nearly 9,000 assistant professor posts remained vacant. He also alleged that more than half of the faculty positions in leading universities, including the University of Madras, Madurai Kamaraj University and Bharathidasan University, had not been filled.

Nainar further claimed that over 30,000 secondary-grade teacher posts and more than 20,000 graduate teacher posts in government schools were lying vacant. He said more than 7,000 government nurses were awaiting regularisation, while gangmen in the Tamil Nadu Electricity Board had been demanding merit-based appointments. Citing media reports, he also claimed that nearly 61 per cent of posts in the Nilgiris Electricity Distribution Circle remained vacant.

He said sanitation workers, doctors, anganwadi workers and transport employees were also demanding permanent appointments, and criticised the notification of only 26 vacancies for this year's TNPSC Group-I examination.

Questioning why the government had not announced a department-wise recruitment calendar despite thousands clearing TET and TRB examinations, Nagenthran said, "Just as appointment orders were issued swiftly to the Karur victims' families, the government must immediately fill vacancies across departments and give deserving youth the opportunities they have earned."