Thousands of students marched to the Jharkhand Assembly on August 10. Their demand was simple: cancel the JSSC-CGL exam and order a CBI probe into alleged irregularities. Five were injured in clashes.
This is not the first time. Recruitment exams in Jharkhand have been mired in paper leaks and delays for years. Aspirants have been sitting at Jaipal Singh Munda Stadium for weeks. The state government agreed to cancel 3 exams the day before the march. It wasn’t enough.
Force was used. Barricades were broken. A former JPSC chairman was arrested. Rahul Gandhi called it an attack on democracy. The BJP blamed the Hemant Soren government. The Centre says it’s ready for discussion in Parliament.
But discussion cannot come after batons. When young people who studied for years feel cheated by the system, telling them to “wait for an inquiry” is not governance. It’s abdication.
Jharkhand’s problem is India’s problem. Every state has a story of a cancelled exam, a leaked paper, a protest. The cost is not just political. It’s a generation losing faith that merit matters.
If the CBI probe is needed, order it. If the exam process is flawed, scrap it and rebuild. But don’t make students bleed for asking. A government that cannot conduct fair recruitment cannot claim to represent the youth.
Jharkhand must decide: does it want to investigate, or does it want to suppress? The students have already made their choice.