A clip from a 2018 Tamil film recently went viral, with its ludicrous suggestion about candidates clearing the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) examination and the following recruitment. The film clip suggests that a rank in the ‘first category’ would immediately offer the candidate a service his/her preference.
On Wednesday, Supriya Sahu, Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer and the Tamil Nadu government’s Principal Secretary of Environment, Climate Change and Forests shared a 27-second clip from the film Saamy 2 on Twitter, feigning ignorance about the allotment process at the Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration (LBSNAA).
‘Direct service allotment at LBSNAA… never knew it happens like this’, Sahu tweeted, receiving hundreds of retweets and over 4,000 likes.
The clip shows the film’s protagonist Aarusaamy, played by Tamil superstar Vikram, at the LBSNAA, where he is told by the administrators that he has been “selected in the first category” and is free to choose the service of his choice.
Aarusaamy responds with his preference of the Indian Police Service (IPS) and is next seen in character in police uniform.
In actuality, any prospective civil services officer needs to first clear the UPSC exam and the interview process. Candidates then express their preferred cadre as well location, or ‘zone’, in descending order. The allocations take into account these preferences as well as the available vacancies. Candidates undergo foundation courses and intensive training before being posted to their respective cadres.
Several Twitter users mocked the film, including Sahu’s peers in administration. ‘I opted for Indian Foreign Service(IFS) before this board but they have allotted me Indian Forest Service’, IFS officer Mohan Chandra Pargaein quipped.
Several users also referenced the lateral recruitment process for the civil services, as previously tweeted by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman.
