New Delhi: Aiming at eliminating the scope for malpractices in its recruitment process, Indian Railways is conducting the world's "largest" online examination to fill up over 18,000 vacancies in various categories.


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A whopping 92 lakh candidates had applied for the jobs, of whom 2.73 lakh qualified the preliminary exam and were called for written test on January 17-19, said a senior Railway Ministry official.


The online examination is being undertaken by the Railway Recruitment Boards to fill up 18,252 graduate-level Group-3 posts, including assistant station master, goods guard, inquiry-cum-reservation clerk, traffic and commercial apprentices and junior accounts assistant.


Earlier, recruitment examinations used to be conducted manually, but the railways had to abandon the manual system and opt for online mode after a few alleged incidents of question paper leak.


Describing it as the "largest online examination in the world", the official said that in order to ensure complete transparency, the railways has introduced the system of showing answer papers online to examinees one week after the examination.


"We have shown the examinees the answers given by them and the correct answers of the questions. We had also given them opportunities to raise objections, if any, till January 30," he said.


The next stage for selection is the psychological tests for assistant station masters and typing test for senior clerks and the appointment letters are expected to be given to successful candidates by May this year.


At present, there are about 2 lakh vacancies in the railways which has about 13 lakh employees.


However, all the vacancies will not be filled up as many posts are being frozen at the moment, he said.


The railways will begin next recruitment drive for about 20,000 vacancies, including in the posts of assistant loco pilots and technical supervisor, in the next phase.