COIMBATORE: Advocates and members of the Tandhai

(TPDK) staged a protest in front of the district collector’s office here on Monday, condemning the state government’s move of allowing candidates from other states to take up the recruitment examination for the post of district-level judges.

Until recently, only residents of Tamil Nadu were allowed to adorn the post of district-level judges. “This restriction is lifted now,” said Ku Ramakrishnan, general secretary of TPDK.

The recruitment examination for the district level judges is due to take place.

“With the move, locals would not only lose their job opportunities, but also their basic rights. Apart from that, if people, who don’t know Tamil, are posted as district judges, how could they communicate properly when most people speak only the local language? At the end of the day, public would be affected because of the move,” he said. Ramakrishnan also suggested the possibility of making Hindi the medium of communication in the courts.

Coming down heavily on the state government for removing

paper from the preliminary examinations of Group II and Group II A conducted by

, he said that could be seen as a move to encourage people from other states to take up the state government examinations. He demanded the government to revert to the old pattern of examination.

“Earlier, the Southern Railways had selected 572 people to fill vacant group D posts at Madurai division. Of them, only 11 were from the state. Similar was the case when they recruited people at Trichy division. Tamils are being ignored and they are losing job opportunities,” Ramakrishnan said.