Minister for Agriculture Ghulam Nabi Lone Hanjura, while responding to a question on behalf of Minister for Home, said 11,442 SPOs have been engaged in the last three years in the state.Replying to a question of Legislators Ghulam Nabi Monga and Thakur Balbir Singh, the Minister said District Level Committees were constituted in 2016 under the chairmanship of concerned Deputy Commissioners to carry out the process of engagements of SPOs.While intervening in the question, Minister for Parliamentary Affairs Abdul Rehman Veeri said the state government carried out a transparent recruitment process for engagement of SPOs in the police department.He further informed that previously the engagements of SPOs were carried out on operational grounds by the concerned district Senior Superintendent of Police/Unit Heads with prior approval of the concerned Authorities i.e. Police Headquarters/Zonal Heads/Range Deputy Inspector General of Police, taking into consideration the right aptitude, ability to collect actionable intelligence and its speedy dissemination as also yearning to be a part of the state security set-up.“No specific qualification was prescribed for the engagement of SPOs prior to 2016,” the Minister said, adding that after August 2016, matric was prescribed as minimum qualification for their engagement.He informed that no physical test was conducted for their engagement prior to 2016, however after august 2016, the physical test for recruitment of SPOs was conducted through designated selection committee and 5,689 SPOs have undergone the physical test after 2016.