BENGALURU: For most of her life, merit never failed 26-year-old Dr Bhavana T. She was among Chikkamagaluru district toppers in the SSLC examination with 97%, repeated the feat in PUC with another 97% and graduated from Veterinary College, Gadag, with a Cumulative Performance Record (CPR) of 8.1. Every examination, she believed, brought her a step closer to her dream of becoming a government veterinary officer. Instead, it brought her to the Vidhana Soudha Police Station.
Alleging that merit was compromised by money and influence in the Karnataka Public Service Commission’s (KPSC) recruitment of veterinary officers, Bhavana is among the aspirants who has now approached the police seeking justice.
The daughter of government school teachers from Chikkamagaluru, Bhavana said she grew up believing that hard work was the only path to success. “Today, I am forced to question that belief. It feels like hard work alone is no longer enough. If you have money or influence, you can bypass the system and get what you want,” she said.
Soon after Bhavana graduated in 2024, KPSC on July 29 issued the notification to recruit veterinary officers. “I decided not to take up a job because I wanted to focus entirely on the exam. I spent months preparing for the exam scheduled for April 2025. But it was postponed indefinitely without a fresh date being announced.
Given KPSC’s track record, we had no idea when it would actually be held,” she said. The exam was eventually conducted in December 2025. The provisional selection list was published in January this year, followed by the final list in July.
Bhavana said the final list left her, like several other candidates, stunned. “It wasn’t just because my name wasn’t there. We studied together for five-and-a-half years. We know each other’s academic strengths and performances. When we saw some of the names that figured at the top of the final list, many of us found it difficult to reconcile it with what we knew from our years in college.
That is what raised serious doubts in our minds,” she said. “Looking at the final list, we genuinely felt something was not right. That is why we have decided to approach the police,” she said. She demanded that the police investigate not just the top-ranked candidates, but every candidate on the final selection list.
Dr Manjunatha, another complainant, said the controversy extends beyond the aspirations of a few unsuccessful candidates. “The last major recruitment of veterinary officers was in 2017. Thousands of qualified veterinary graduates have been waiting for years for regular recruitment. Many candidates are now over 30 years old and have put major life decisions on hold while preparing for the examination,” he said.
Referring to National Commission for Agriculture’s recommendation of one veterinarian for every 5,000 animals, Manjunatha claims in several parts of north, central and coastal Karnataka, a single veterinarian is serving between 60,000 and 1 lakh animals. He argued that the alleged irregularities in KPSC are not merely denying deserving candidates government jobs but are worsening the state’s acute shortage of veterinary doctors.
“The impact goes far beyond us,” he said, adding that the vacancies in the state’s Animal Husbandry Department have a direct bearing on farmers’ livelihoods, livestock healthcare, disease surveillance, milk production, meat production and food safety. The consequences are borne by the entire rural economy, he said.
He said uncertainty has also affected candidates’ personal lives. “Some of us are finding it difficult to get married, because prospective families prefer candidates with secure government jobs,” he said.
According to him, the prolonged uncertainty surrounding government recruitment is also changing the career choices of young veterinarians. “We are increasingly advising students not to depend on government jobs in Karnataka and instead look for opportunities in the private sector,” Manjunatha said. “We have reasons to believe that some candidates were approached by middlemen, seeking Rs 80 lakh to get their names in the final list,” he said.
Bhavana, who works with the 1962 Animal Mobile Medical Ambulance Service, said the experience has altered her own career plans. “I have decided to prepare for the UPSC exam. Several veterinary doctors are now doing the same because UPSC follows a fixed calendar, conducts exams on schedule and declares results transparently without yielding to any influence. Our confidence in the KPSC recruitment has been shaken by the alleged irregularities,” she said.
