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Journalism of Courage
Thousands of candidates thronged depots and stations of the Gujarat State Road Transport Corporation (GSRTC) to return to their homes across the state after the government deferred the recruitment examination of junior clerks after the alleged question paper leak Sunday morning. After orders from the state government, the GSRTC pulled 1,800 buses from its fleet and ran special trips to help nearly 88,000 candidates reach their homes.
With the Gujarat Panchayat Service Selection Board (GPSSB) postponing the examination only hours before the exam Sunday, thousands of job aspirants, who had undertaken journeys to reach their respective examination centres—mostly outside their native districts, raised slogans at the stations and depots. Minor incidents of vandalism were also reported, GSRTC sources said.
The sudden influx of thousands of people led to chaos and minor incidents of vandalism. But by 5 pm, GSRTC ran the additional service to help more than 88,000 candidates return to their homes by offering them free rides on special extra trips.
“After receiving instructions from honourable Chief Minister, Transport Minister and GPSSB, we started arranging for special trips,” Mukul Gandhi, vice-chairman and managing director (MD) of GSRTC, told media persons in Ahmedabad.
He said GSRTC offered free rides to candidates who carried examination hall tickets and valid photo identity cards.
He added that those who had purchased tickets or had booked in advance would get refunds.
“There was chaos at our bus stations for some time as thousands of job aspirants arrived at a time. This was not expected as their examination was originally scheduled to get over at noon and accordingly, we had planned to run extra buses in the afternoon. As buses were already plying on routine routes, it took us a while to arrange extra buses,” Gandhi said, adding the situation was brought under control around 1 pm.
“As many as 1.4 lakh job aspirants were to travel to Ahmedabad city alone to take the examination. But after getting instructions from the government, we pressed 1,200 extra buses into service and ferried around 70,000 candidates across the state,” Gandhi said, adding, the order was restored at Ahmedabad bus port around 12:30 pm.
GSRTC has a fleet of 8,322 buses and the public transport service provider spared around 22 per cent of its total buses to help candidates return home following cancellation of the examination.
Around 9.5 lakh job aspirants had registered for the junior clerk (administrative/accounts) recruitment examination. GPSSB was to conduct the examinations at nearly 3,000 centres across the state.
The MD said that GSRTC dialled police for help after hordes of candidates started arriving at bus stops and bus stations in hope of catching the first bus back home. “We sought help from the additional director general of police (law and order) and his office, in turn, gave necessary instructions to police officers in districts to ensure law and order at our bus stations,” Gandhi said.
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