'Over 44,000 reserved posts vacant in central government deparments'

NEW DELHI: Over 44,000 posts meant for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Other Backward Castes are lying vacant in central government departments, the Rajya Sabha was informed today.

"A special recruitment drive for filling backlog reserved vacancies for SCs, STs and OBCs was launched in 2008. As per information received from 74 ministries or departments 77,998 backlog reserved vacancies were identified as on November 1, 2008, out of which 33,786 backlog reserved vacancies were filled by June 30, 2011," Minister of State for Personnel, Public grievances and Pensions, V Narayanasamy said in a written reply.

He said the drive was re-launched and all the central ministries were requested to fill up the remaining backlog reserved vacancies by March this year.

"The ministries or departments have been asked to submit final progress report of the drive by April 30, 2012," the minister said.