Assalaamu alaykum. I am in the 1:2 selection list (my ranking is 5 out of 20) of a government job in which the candidates are selected through a competitive exam conducted by the governement. There are 10 vacant posts in which 20 candidates are shortlisted through competitive exam and 10 candidates are finalized in the counselling conducted by the authority so that the top 10 candidates are going to get the job. However, it happened that a candidate with ranking 11 contacted me (before counselling) and offered me money to withdraw my selection so that he would come up in the ranking and get selected. Is it halal for me to take that money and withdraw my application for the job?

All perfect praise be to Allaah, The Lord of the worlds. I testify that there is none worthy of worship except Allaah and that Muhammad is His slave and Messenger.

What we understood from the question is that the candidate in the eleventh rank wants you to give up your right to the tenth rank and withdraw so that he would come up in the ranking and get selected in return for compensation (an amount of money). The scholars held different views regarding the permissibility of giving up such a right in return for compensation. The Maaliki scholars held that it is permissible to give up certain rights in return for compensation, such as the right of shufʻah (pre-emption in selling co-owned property) and the right of the woman to give up her turn in overnight stay with her husband in favor of her co-wife. Some Hanafi scholars maintained that it is permissible to give up one's job in return for compensation. The Hanafis and Maalikis both held that it is permissible to give up the right to custody over children in return for compensation. Ibn Rushd wrote, "If a person said to another (trying to buy the same property), 'Leave this property for me to buy, and I shall give you a dinar,' then that is valid and the sayer is liable to pay the dinar regardless of whether he bought it or not..."

The Kuwaiti Encyclopedia of Islamic Jurisprudence reads:

"The terms 'faraagh and ifraagh' are used by Muslim jurists to refer to relinquishing one's rights, such as giving up one's job whose salary is paid from an endowment or the like, or giving up one's ownership of what is called 'khuluww' (i.e. usufruct right like a tenant's right to stay at a rented place until the end of the duration agreed upon in the tenancy agreement) to another in return for compensation. It is called ifraagh to distinguish it from the sale transaction that involves the transfer of full ownership of the property itself along with the usufruct rights. Sale denotes the transfer of both the ownership of the title of the property (i.e. ownership of the property itself, known as Milk-ul Raqabah) and the ownership of its usufruct (i.e. the right to use the property, called Haqq-ul Manfa'ah). Perhaps the transaction is called ifraagh because the owner in this case owns the usufruct of the property only and not the property itself; he has the right to retain the usufruct rights in the property. The statement of Shaykh ʿUlaysh was to the same effect..."

Hence, there is no harm on you in giving up this ranking for him in return for a compensation.

Allaah knows best.