Candidates cry foul over RAS exam marking

Scores of candidates who appeared for the 2012 Rajasthan Administrative Services exam are claiming glaring discrepancies in the marking of their answer sheets after accessing the same using RTI applications.
Several of these candidates, who have successfully cleared the exam whose result was announced in July this year, said that their ranking has suffered due to the alleged inconsistency in the marking pattern wherein the same answer has been ticked correct in one script but marked as incorrect in another.
Charging that the scripts obtained by them shows that the marking for the RAS 2012 was done without a model answer key, these candidates are now demanding a CBI inquiry into the matter and have formed an 'RAS Pariksha Sangharsh Samiti' to pursue the matter.

"After the RAS 2012 results were declared, around 300 candidates who got selected but were not satisfied with their ranking acquired the answer sheets through RTI," said Ravindra Mohan Sharma, the president of the Samiti.
"Shocking state of wrong and incorrect marking was found in these answer sheets, clearly indicating that they were checked without model answer keys," he added.
Jyoti, a teacher at a government school here, said, "Several of my correct answers have been ticked as wrong, causing me a loss of over 20 marks." Having appeared for RAS 2012, Jyoti, too, had accessed her answer sheets using RTI after she was selected for the allied services.

Another teacher at the government senior secondary school, Rajkumari, who similarly obtained her answer sheets using RTI, said that many of her correct answers were marked incorrect while, in other places, she was not marked properly.

Meanwhile, one Alok Sharma, who said he was placed 65th in RAS 2010 but qualified at 440th in the 2012 exam, claimed that incorrect marking had cost him between 50 to 60 marks.
"The marking pattern of the commission has left hundreds of eligible candidates shocked and disappointed," he said. Sharma claimed that the instances of inconsistent marking points to a "selection scam".
He said that over 17,000 candidates had appeared in RAS 2012 main exams of which 3,000 had qualified for the interview. The process had finally seen 1,211 candidates being selected to the prestigious state service.

Some candidates have further claimed that they have received threats after they posted images of the answer sheets obtained through RTI on social media.
The allegations by these candidates come even as the CBI is investigating massive irregularities in the alleged Vyapam scam in Madhya Pradesh.