Last year, the Ministry of Railway advertised for recruitment to over 1.2 lakh vacant posts in Group C, Group D, which was claimed to be the largest recruitment drive ever made in the world. But as per an RTI report, the largest recruitment drive is actually half of the total manpower required by the Indian Railway at present.
“According to the Railways, as on September 1, 2018, 2,66,790 (Provisional) of Group C and erstwhile Group D posts are vacant over zonal railways. And this doesn’t include Group A and Group B services,” mentioned an RTI reply, as reported by news agency IANS.
“When asked for a breakdown of number of people retiring and the number of job opportunities generated over the last decade, the data was disturbing. The results show that that from 2008 to 2018, not even in a single year, did more people get jobs than the number of employees who retired. As a result, the number of vacancies went up to around 3 lakh,” said the RTI report.
The report also revealed that the number of employees is decreasing over the years. “In the year 2008-09, the number of employees in Indian Railway was 13,86,011 which was reduced to 13,08,323 in 2016-17,” revealed the RTI report.
Though the number of employees increased in Group A category, there was an abysmal decrease in the Group D category. “In Group A, the number of employees increased from 8,382 in 2008-09 to 9,741 in 2016-17, while in Group D it was reduced from 4,56,227 to 80,612.”
The recruitment of retired staff was also reduced from 42,149 during 2007-08 to 19,100 in 2017-18, mentioned the RTI report.
