Staff Reporter
ITANAGAR, 4 Apr: The Pan Arunachal Joint Steering Committee (PAJSC) on Tuesday accused the state government of “playing hide and seek” with the aspirants over their 13-point charter of demands, including declaring null and void all the exams conducted by the Arunachal Pradesh Public Service Commission (APPSC) in which anomalies have been found.
Addressing a press conference, PAJSC chairman Techi Puru claimed that “the government did not sincerely recommend for null and void to the commission; rather, it just sent minutes of the 18 February, 2023 meeting between the PAJSC and the All Nyishi Students’ Union (ANSU) members and the government representative on 28 February.”
“The government has washed off its hand. It did not recommend null and void but just sent the minutes of 18 February, 2023 meeting between the PAJSC and the ANSU and the government,” Puru claimed.
Accusing the state government of being insincere with regard to the aspirants’ ‘null and void’ demand, Puru claimed that “Joint Secretary Mari Angu wrote a letter to the APPSC secretary on 28 February, furnishing the minutes of their 18 February meeting with the government.”
“Joint Secretary Mari Angu cannot write directly to the secretary to the commission. This is not government official correspondent. It should have been written through cabinet decision,” he said.
“Instead of writing love letter between Mari Angu and joint secretary of the commission, it should have reflected the malpractices found in those examinations, and termination of officers through cabinet decision,” he added.
He also slammed the government and the cabinet ministers who had said that the commission is defunct.
“The commission is not defunct. Rather, it is functional. The public are being given the wrong notion. The commission cannot be defunct. There are officers, members and secretary to the commission. They are drawing salaries from the commission. How can the commission be defunct?” he demanded to know.
He further appealed to the chief minister to “immediately recommend for null and void after placing it before the cabinet.”
Also slamming the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) over its probe into former APPSC undersecretary Tumi Gangkak’s mysterious death, Puru claimed that “there are some circle officers and a DSP who cleared the APPSCCE by forging signatures.”
He alleged that “those officers might be involved in tracking down the aspirants and the officers who were about to give statement.”
PAJSC member Tadak Nalo claimed that “the enforcement directorate (ED) is unnecessarily harassing Gyamar Padang, who exposed the APPSC paper leak scam.”
The PAJSC members demanded that an ED office be set up in Itanagar to investigate the APPSC paper leak scam.
The aspirants also demanded that “all the financial transactions of the accused and the commission members, officers and chairman should be investigated.”
Nalo further accused the government of “weakening the PAJSC’s movement by initiating departmental inquiry against PAJSC chairman Techi Puru.”
He demanded also that all the cases registered against the aspirants at five different police stations be immediately withdrawn.
The aspirants opined that the ED would be better than the CBI and the SIC in investigating the scam.
