The list of selected veterinarians for the 843 Veterinary Assistant Surgeon (VAS) posts in Tamil Nadu has been posted at the DMS offices of the Veterinary and Animal Husbandry department. This announcement brings cheer to the current veterinary workforce as multiple new livestock and animal husbandry schemes are being implemented by the AIADMK government led by chief minister Dr.J. Jayalalitha
Unfortunately, the process by which the candidates were selected was not apparent and there is a lot of confusion among the eligible veterinarians who were not selected.
The certificate verification was carried out in February and there was skepticism around why there has been such a long delay since then to announce the final list. The final list, when published, only added to the confusion.
It is hoped that the department will voluntarily publish additional statistics and details on how the candidates were selected for inclusion in the final list. Some of the candidates whose names have not been included are said to be considering invoking the RTI Act to get this information, if it is not published voluntarily by the department.
