A total of 775,000 people took a nationwide exam in 38 cities of China to qualify for 13,500 posts as national civil servants on Sunday.

In order to create a fair and clean environment for the most intense competition with at least 98 out of every 100 exam takers to have no chance for success, local departments, in cooperation with the police and radio management bureaus, severely cracked down on exam cheaters using wireless apparatus and the Internet, according to the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security.

Those who cheated in the exam would have "zero score" and would not be allowed to apply for the exam in five years, the ministry said, adding relevant departments had paid great attention ensuring exam papers were not leaked before the exam.

The 2009 central government recruitment offered only 13,500 positions, roughly the same with previous years. The results for the written exam would be announced in January and those who passed it would enter into the interview round.

A government job was still considered a plum post for university graduates and other Chinese job-seekers as the global financial crisis prompted many private companies to cut the number of employees, the Guangzhou Daily reported.

It said the economic and social status, welfare insurance and prestige associated with a government position in China had attracted more and more applicants.

Statistics show more than 4,500 applicants would compete for a position with the China Disabled Persons' Federation, ranking the most popular government post among exam takers.

Positions with seismological bureaus across the country were also popular with this year's exam takers, according to the Modern Express, a newspaper based in southern Jiangsu Province, partly due to the devastating earthquake that struck southwestern Sichuan in May.

Hepatitis B virus carriers would be considered eligible candidates when they were ruled out to be Hepatitis B patients after medical examination, according to a new physical check-up standard for civil servant recruitment, which was aimed at removing employment discrimination.

The written test includes two sessions, the administrative aptitude test(AAT) in the morning and the essay test in the afternoon, before a more competitive interview at the beginning of 2009.

China has been organizing civil servant recruitment examinations every year since 1994.

(Xinhua News Agency November 30, 2008)