Staff Reporter Panaji
The Goa Commission for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes has recommended that the Commissioner of Commercial Taxes conduct a second attempt examination for the posts of Commercial Tax Officer (CTO), Assistant Commercial Tax Officer (ACTO), and Commercial Tax Inspector (CTI) to fill backlog vacancies reserved for the Scheduled Tribes (ST) category. This recommendation is in line with Article 16 (4B) of the Constitution of India.
The recommendation follows a petition filed by the Gawada, Kunbi, Velip, and Dhangar (GAKUVED) Federation on behalf of employees from the Scheduled Tribe community working in the state’s commercial tax department. The petition called for modifications to the current examination process, including changes to passing marks, aggregate scores, the number of attempts, and the introduction of grace marks. It also requested that the examination be made comparable to those conducted by the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) and Goa Public Service Commission (GPSC), with provisions for considering candidates’ experience and departmental records.
In addition, the federation urged the Commission to direct the Commissioner of Commercial Taxes to prioritise filling the backlog vacancies of CTO, ACTO, CTI, and Upper Division Clerk exclusively with eligible Scheduled Tribe candidates. It also called for the Director of Tribal Welfare to prevent the de-reservation of these vacancies or their filling on an ad-hoc or officiating basis by candidates from the general category.
Chairperson of the Goa Commission for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, Deepak Karmalkar, ruled in favour of the petition, recommending necessary amendments to the recruitment rules. This includes the inclusion of a second attempt examination for filling the ST-reserved vacancies and relaxation in passing marks for the SC and ST categories.
The Commission has instructed the Commercial Taxes Department to submit an action-taken report within 60 days of receiving the recommendation.
