States » NorthPosted at: Nov 5 2026 6:49PM


Punjab PCS exam results trigger political row as BJP, Congress demand probe into alleged irregularities

Neeraj Bali
Chandigarh, Nov 5 (UNI) Punjab's civil services mains examination results have triggered a political controversy, with the BJP and Congress accusing Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann's government of failing to ensure transparency in recruitment and demanding an independent investigation into alleged irregularities in the shortlisting of candidates.
Punjab Congress president Pargat Singh, former state BJP chief Sunil Jakhar and BJP leader Ravneet Singh Bittu, a former union minister, questioned the unusually high number of shortlisted candidates from certain examination rooms, clusters of consecutive roll numbers and allegations that absent candidates had figured on the selection list.
The Punjab Public Service Commission (PPSC) declared the results of the Punjab State Civil Services Combined Competitive Examination-2025 mains on November 4, provisionally shortlisting 751 candidates for interviews against 331 advertised vacancies.
The mains examination was conducted between April 1 and 10, 2026, while document verification for shortlisted candidates is scheduled at the commission's Patiala office from November 11 to 17.
"Serious questions over the Punjab PCS Mains result!" Pargat Singh, who is also the MLA from Jalandhar Cantonment, said in a post on X.
He cited complaints that 10 to 11 candidates had been shortlisted from individual examination rooms at four centres, with qualification rates exceeding 40% in some rooms.
Singh also questioned the wide variation in shortlisting rates, citing 24.21% at one examination centre compared with 2.89% in a group of rooms at another centre.
He raised concerns over consecutive roll numbers among shortlisted candidates and allegations that the list included roll numbers belonging to aspirants who had not appeared for the examination.
"Bhagwant Mann ji, answer these questions. The PPSC Chairman must clarify, and an impartial inquiry must be ordered," Singh said.
"Punjab's youth deserve a fair recruitment process," he added.
Jakhar, who previously headed the Punjab BJP, demanded a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) inquiry, alleging that the examination results had undermined the Aam Aadmi Party government's claims of providing jobs without bribes or recommendations.
He claimed that 86 shortlisted candidates appeared in clusters of three or four consecutive roll numbers, raising questions about whether the allocation of roll numbers and seating arrangements required investigation.
"Was this entire setting done at the time of issuing roll numbers? Were certain favoured candidates deliberately allotted consecutive roll numbers as part of a planned conspiracy?" Jakhar asked.
He also referred to earlier controversies involving recruitment examinations in Punjab and questioned whether the reported patterns could be explained without examining the underlying records.
"This is a question of the dreams, hopes and future of Punjab's youth," Jakhar said, calling for a CBI investigation to establish the facts.
Bittu, who resigned as union minister of state for railways and food processing industries in July, also questioned the credibility of the results and demanded that the interview process be halted pending an independent investigation.
He cited figures showing that 11 of 24 candidates from Room 8 at Centre 7 had been shortlisted, representing a qualification rate of 45.8%.
Bittu also pointed to rooms at Centres 11 and 4 where 10 of 24 candidates reportedly qualified, equivalent to 41.7%.
He questioned the disparity between the reported overall shortlisting rate of 24.21% at Centre 8 and 2.89% for Rooms 1 to 7 at Centre 1.
The BJP leader urged the government to preserve the examination answer scripts and have the recruitment process examined by an independent agency or the CBI.
The controversy has brought the state's two principal opposition parties together in questioning the recruitment process, although they have raised their concerns separately.
The Mann government has repeatedly cited recruitment to government departments as one of its major achievements, maintaining that appointments are being made on merit without political recommendations or payments.
The opposition leaders said the reported patterns required a transparent explanation from the commission to restore confidence among candidates.
However, unusually high shortlisting rates in individual examination rooms or clusters of consecutive roll numbers do not, by themselves, establish manipulation or wrongdoing.
The allegations would require verification against official attendance records, roll-number allocation procedures, seating arrangements, answer scripts and evaluation data.
The claim that absent candidates were included among those shortlisted has also not been independently substantiated.
The PPSC and the Punjab government had not issued a detailed response to the specific allegations in the reports available on Thursday.
The commission's explanation is expected to be crucial in determining whether the reported patterns reflect statistical variations, administrative errors or irregularities warranting further investigation.
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Tags: #Punjab PCS exam results trigger political row as BJP# Congress demand probe into alleged irregularities
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