HYDERABAD: The appointment of chief superintendents and departmental officers for the upcoming Intermediate Public Examination (IPE) 2025 theory exams, scheduled from March 5 to March 25, has snowballed into a controversy.
According to government junior college lecturers, the decentralised appointment process, which had been in practice for a long time until last year — wherein the District Examination Committees (DEC) used to appoint chief superintendents and departmental officers to nearby colleges — has now been centralised, with the Telangana Board of Intermediate Education (TGBIE) making the appointments directly and in an unscientific manner by posting faculty members to distant examination centres, between 80 km and 120 km away.
As per an earlier order issued by TGBIE secretary Krishna Aditya on February 18, the departmental officers and chief superintendents were to be deployed in the same mandal or town within a 25 km distance. However, the same order was later revised, and the criterion for distance was ignored.
Stating that the move would only lead to impediments in conducting the exams in over 1,800 centres across 33 districts, the Telangana Government Junior Lecturers’ Association wrote a letter to Principal Secretary of Education Yogita Rana, highlighting that examination officials were earlier deployed to colleges not far from their workplace or residences only by the DEC, as per TGBIE norms. However, the TGBIE has now directly appointed officials, assigning them to locations between 80 km and 120 km away, thus making it extremely challenging for them to meet strict deadlines for reaching the exam centres with question papers.
Speaking to TNIE, P. Madhusudhan Reddy, president of the association, said, “The chief superintendents and departmental officers have to reach the designated police station by 8 am to collect the question papers and then reach the colleges assigned to them. If the officials are posted to centres that are far away, it can compromise the entire process of conducting the exam in a time-bound manner, as longer distances involve the risk of heavy traffic, increased stress levels, and even accidents. We are demanding that officials be appointed to nearby colleges, as has been the practice for at least 20 years.”
He further stated that earlier, each lecturer was assigned for only three days at the exam centres, with four batches covering the exam duration. However, now, one official has been posted for the entire exam schedule. “We have requested the secretary to review the postings. If they fail to meet our demands, we will reach out to the chief minister, and as a last resort, we will boycott the exams,” Madhusudhan added.
Officials were unavailable when TNIE tried to reach them for their comments.