Thousands of students gathered on railway tracks and at stations on January 25 to protest against irregularities in the Railway Recruitment Board’s Non-Technical Popular Categories (RRB-NTPC) Exam of 2021. More than 1 crore students had applied for the examination for 35,000 vacant posts. Around 60 lakh students appeared for the examination, of whom seven lakh candidates qualifying the first stage.

Applicants claim that the recruitment process favoured those with higher educational qualifications. In some cases, the same candidate has reportedly qualified for multiple posts in different regions. The students are also angry about the Railway Recruitment Board’s decision to hold the examination in two stages.

One person who had an explanation was coaching centre tutor and YouTuber “Khan Sir”. Speaking to NDTV’s Sanket Upadhyay he said, “The examinations for graduate and intermediate candidates are being conducted together – in such circumstances, the graduates stand to benefit. The discrepancy in cut-off marks is a reason for dissatisfaction too. The lower cut-off marks of 83 for graduate candidates means they are being favoured for posts that were meant for the intermediate candidates. Some 7.5 lakh candidates were supposed to get their results by now, yet only 3.8 lakh have, with most graduate candidates qualifying for multiple posts.”

Although unrelated to this TV appearance, the tutor has been booked on charges of inciting violence during a protest in Patna on Monday. He has been accused of encouraging protestors to damage public property through a widely circulated social media video. An FIR was lodged after protestors blocked New Delhi-Kolkata railway tracks, congregated in Bihar’s Arrah and Sharif Railway stations, and set a train on fire.

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Students protest against discrepancies in Railway Recruitment Board exam in Patna, Prayagraj