Hundreds of engineers protest sham job interview

Overseas ministry official says recruitment agency will be probed

ISLAMABAD: Hundreds of engineers, who have been waiting in long queues outside a private hotel in the high-security Red Zone in the federal capital for the past three days, were disappointed when the recruitment agency announced that they have finalised the candidates. Some also started protesting against the company and the recruiting agency.

Gul Nawaz, a civil engineer hailing from Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) told The Express Tribune that the Islamic Manpower Recruiting Agency along with Qatar’s Petrochemical Association had issued a call for interviews for engineers and ‘walk-in’ interviews were to be conducted at a private hole in the red zone of Islamabad.

Representing the protesting engineers, Nawaz said that the association had announced positions for nationals of three countries including Pakistan, India and Indonesia. The slots which were advertised pertained to mechanical, electrical, civil, automation, process, production engineers and other allied field s.

For candidates from Pakistan, they were asked via traditional advertisements and through electronic communiqués to report to a private hotel in Islamabad for walk-in interviews from July 26 to 28, from 7am to 7pm.

Responding to the call, Nawaz said that he, along with around a thousand other engineers, including electrical and chemical engineers, arrived at the hotel and camped outside the property, awaiting their turn.

He said that many of them hailed from outside the twin cities of Islamabad and Rawalpindi and had to take up residence in private hostels, guesthouses or hotels which dot the federal capital.

However, after arriving in the hotel, Nawaz claimed that they learnt that the recruitment drive for the association was allegedly being managed by a company called “Islamic Manpower Recruitment Agency” and that they were told that the positions had been.

“They [allegedly] finalised a list of recruits, selecting their favourites and those who had allegedly paid bribes “ Nawaz claimed, adding that highly-educated engineers from across Pakistan, including places such as Karachi, Peshawar, AJK and Multan had travelled to the federal capital to give interviews.

He added that they stood in queues for three days but were never called in for an interview.

When they started to protest, Nawaz said that an official of the recruitment agency came and started collecting resumes from the candidates.

However, protesters claimed that after taking their resumes, they kept waiting for the company to call them in for interviews but the call never came.

“We feel so disappointed at the fraud,” Nawaz claimed. He urged the prime minister and the interior minister to take immediate action against the agency and to cancel their licence.

When contacted, Ministry of Overseas Pakistanis and Human Resources Director General Kashif Noor told The Express Tribune that the company in question had never secured permission from the government to recruit resources through walk-in-interview.

He assured that the matter of calling in such a large number of job-hopefuls and then not interviewing them will be investigated.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 29^th, 2019.