The Jharkhand High Court on Thursday (August 20) stayed the Hemant Soren government’s decision to cancel the 11th–13th Jharkhand Combined Civil Services examination, and stayed the operation of notifications cancelling appointments of government employees recruited through the examination.

The stay came days after the state government cancelled 22 recruitment examinations/processes, including the 11th–13th JPSC, and put 23 others on hold or under investigation over alleged irregularities. The cancellations followed a 26-day student agitation, during which the JSSC-CGL examination was one of the protesters’ key demands.

According to an August 18 notification of the Karmik, Administrative Reforms and Rajbhasha Department, the government cancelled 22 recruitment examinations/processes, suspended six pending investigation and referred 17 older JPSC recruitments for a CID probe. Together, the decisions affect 45 recruitment processes.

The government’s action cuts across almost every layer of the state’s specialist recruitment system — from civil servants, judges and prosecutors to engineers, doctors, dentists, agricultural officers, forest officers, scientists and university teachers.

But the impact is not the same for everyone. While lakhs of aspirants now face the prospect of starting recruitment processes afresh, some candidates who had already cleared stages of examinations have lost the progress they had made.

For those who have already joined government service, the cancellation raises a more complicated question: whether and how their appointments will be affected, and what happens to the posts they currently occupy.

Of the 22 recruitment examinations/processes cancelled by the government, four had already reached the appointment stage, making their cancellation particularly consequential for candidates who had already been selected or appointed. These include the 11th–13th Jharkhand Combined Civil Services examination, through which appointments were made against 342 posts; the JSSC Combined Graduate Level (JSSC-CGL) examination, through which 1,932 candidates had already been appointed; the Child Development Project Officer (CDPO) recruitment, involving 64 posts; and the Food Safety Officer recruitment, involving 56 posts. The remaining cancelled recruitments were at different stages of the selection and appointment process.

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For Ashish Akshat, who secured Rank 1 in the 11th–13th JPSC Combined Civil Services Examination and was selected for the State Police Service, the cancellation has come after nearly a year of service and undergoing training.

He said he and other selected candidates have not received any communication or instructions from the government on what happens to their appointments. “We are also figuring out what is going on. We didn’t expect this,” he said.

Akshat said the uncertainty was difficult to process after candidates had spent years preparing for the examination and had begun building their lives around their new careers. “There is a grey area. We also don’t know what to do or what will happen next,” he said.

A State Tax Officer selected through the same examination said the cancellation had left those already in service without clarity about their future. He has been serving in Jharkhand since December and is nearing completion of his training. He said neither he nor his colleagues had received any separate communication or instructions beyond the government order cancelling the examination. “Everything is in limbo,” he said.

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Some of his colleagues from the administrative services have already been posted in districts and are performing official duties, including serving as magistrates during the Shravani Mela, he said.

The officer, who requested anonymity, said he had earlier worked for eight years at Coal India Limited before leaving the job to prepare for the civil services examination. He had also worked in the private sector before that. “If there was wrongdoing, it is a failure of the system. But how can someone who cleared the examination and was appointed be held responsible without evidence?” he said.

What triggered the action?

The immediate trigger for the student agitation was the controversy surrounding the 14th Jharkhand Combined Civil Services Examination, conducted by the JPSC this April. The preliminary examination was held, after which candidates raised questions over the result. They pointed to the absence of category-wise cut-offs and the lack of signatures from JPSC members on the result.

The controversy intensified when an OMR sheet of a candidate began circulating on social media. The candidate had apparently qualified for the preliminary examination despite the marks visible on the circulated OMR sheet appearing to be below the cut-off. The authenticity of the circulated OMR sheet has not been independently verified. This raised questions among candidates about the fairness of the examination and the evaluation process.

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By July 22, before the student protest began, the state government handed the matter over to the CID for investigation. The CID subsequently formed an SIT, raided the JPSC office and the residences of people connected with the examination and began making arrests. The investigation also brought the examination agency TSR Data Processing and Technical Limited (TDPL) under scrutiny. TDPL was already blacklisted by the Uttar Pradesh government, and JSSC had also blacklisted it in May 2025. Among those arrested was Abhay Tiwari alias Manoj Tiwari, the company’s marketing manager, who was also working as a Block Supply Officer in Godda.

The probe widened, with around 25 people arrested so far, and eventually led to the arrest of former JPSC chairperson L. Khiangte.

How the JPSC issue turned into a larger recruitment controversy

As the JPSC investigation progressed, the student movement expanded beyond the 14th JPSC examination. On July 25, students began protesting in Ranchi, demanding a CBI probe and action against alleged irregularities in several recruitment examinations.

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Over the following weeks, the government held multiple rounds of talks with the protesters. Two demands remained unresolved: a CBI investigation and cancellation of the JSSC Combined Graduate Level (CGL) examination. The government had initially resisted cancelling the CGL examination, particularly because appointments had already been made and the matter had gone through the courts.

The agitation continued for 26 days. After students issued an August 18 ultimatum, the government announced the cancellation of the JSSC CGL examination and examinations conducted through TDPL. The students called off their agitation on August 19. On August 20, however, the Jharkhand High Court stayed the government’s cancellation order.

What happens next?

The government has announced a series of measures to address irregularities in recruitment examinations and prevent them in future. According to the Personnel Department’s order, the government will request the Jharkhand High Court to constitute fast-track courts for the speedy hearing of cases registered in connection with irregularities and malpractice in JPSC and JSSC examinations. It will also set up an internal vigilance cell within both commissions.

The government has further decided to constitute a committee headed by Amitabh Kaushal, IAS, to undertake a detailed study of examination reforms in JPSC and JSSC. The committee will include directors of reputed institutions and other officials and is expected to submit its report to the government within two months.

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The Personnel Department’s order says the 17 earlier examinations will be investigated by the CID for possible irregularities, based on facts brought before the government during the ongoing CID investigation into the JPSC matter.

These examinations span several years, including the 2010 Commercial Taxes Limited Examination, and most predate the current JMM government, although a few are from its tenure as well. The government has also cancelled the Sixth Limited Deputy Collector Examination, conducted in 2018, adding another political dimension to the wider examination controversy.

Political row

The BJP has welcomed the government’s decision to cancel several examinations but questioned the manner in which the cases are being investigated. In a letter to Chief Minister Hemant Soren, the party demanded a CBI probe into the JSSC CGL case, the cancelled JPSC examinations and other exams under scrutiny, alleging that the CID’s earlier investigation had failed to identify the “real masterminds” and beneficiaries. The BJP also questioned the decision to hand the investigation into the cancelled examinations to the CID, arguing that allegations against some CID officials in the CGL case raised concerns about the credibility and independence of the probe. It demanded that the role of officials and members associated with the examination and interview processes be independently investigated.