The higher education ministry's move to hire lecturers based on walk-in interviews - and two essays - has been criticised not just by academicians and researchers, but also by applicants themselves.

One applicant, who only wanted to be identified as Chua said her interview was held on the first of the three-day recruitment fair from May 26.

She was shocked to find out in the next day's newspapers that hundreds had been recruited and offered scholarships on the spot by the participating universities.

"On what criteria were they selected? Why did they tell me to go home and wait for a call when these people were recruited instantly?" she asked when contacted.

"My friends and I have working experience and our academic results are not bad. So why were only certain people selected while others with equivalent qualifications were left out?"

Thousands of people were attracted to the fair at Kuala Lumpur Sentral in Brickfields, with local universities taking up 20 booths.

More than 200 people were hired as academic staff, while some degree holders will be sponsored by their universities for post-graduate studies.

The applicant, a master's student at Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM), also said she has doubts about the credibility of the exercise, based on the way the interview was conducted.

She was asked two questions:

As a lecturer, how would you contribute to an information-based society? (in English)

In the 50th year of independence, how would you contribute to the country?

After she completed the essays, she submitted the answers to officers at UKM's booth and went through an interview conducted by six panelists.

Among the questions posed were 'If you were hired, what would be your teaching methods?'and 'What's the responsibility of a lecturer?'.

'Return autonomy'

Another applicant, who wanted to be known only as Wong, said it was unnecessary to hold the fair since academic staff recruitment is basic responsibility of universities.

"The ministry should have never interfered in this," he said.

When contacted, Tony Pua who blogs at Education in Malaysia, said the ministry should not challenge the autonomy of universities in academic staff recruitment.

Even though the fair is able to sort out the shortage of lecturers for the short term, I think it will create more problems in the future. So I hope the ministry can give back the power to the universities," he said.

Universiti Sains Malaysia researcher Tan Lee Ooi quipped that the ministry must have come up with the idea of a walk-in-interview after watching popular television programme Malaysian Idol.

"We should learn from Singapore universities to look for qualified lecturers during international conferences and not through such open recruitment," he said.