Should age relaxation for SC, ST in Civil Services exam be retained?

Expert Committee Survey

New Delhi: Should relaxation in age limits and higher number of attempts for Scheduled Caste (SC) and Scheduled Tribe (ST) candidates to take civil services examination be retained?

This is among other matters on which response are being sought from public by an expert committee formed to examine issues related to the prestigious exam conducted by Union Public Service Commission to select IAS and IPS officers.

The survey seeks response from people through questions like "civil services examination in its current form provides a certain advantage to the students with an urban background" and "basic knowledge of the English language is necessary for a civil service aspirant in today's context".

The survey is said to be an information gathering exercise by the committee, formed last year by the Centre, headed by former HRD Secretary and retired IAS officer BS Baswan. "Please note that the Union Public Service Commission has not commissioned this survey and it is only an information gathering exercise being undertaken by the expert committee," the Commission has clarified.

The panel is mandated to examine various issues related to age relaxation, eligibility, syllabus and pattern of the civil services examination. It will also review the effectiveness of the existing scheme of the prestigious test in selecting suitable candidates and "suggest the time frame for implementation of the revised pattern of examination".

The civil service examination is conducted by the UPSC annually in three stages preliminary, main and interview--to select officers for Indian Administrative Service (IAS), Indian Foreign Service (IFS) and Indian Police Service (IPS), among others. Lakhs of students appear every year in the test.

The committee was formed after some group of students protested against the present pattern of civil services examination claiming it was bias towards those with urban background, a charge denied by the government.

The survey asks whether "English language proficiency must be tested in civil services preliminary (CSP) examination? and whether Paper II introduced in 2011 has improved the CSP pattern?” There are two compulsory papers--Paper I and Paper II of 200 marks each in civil services preliminary examination.
Students had in 2014 protested against the pattern of Paper II, which was introduced in 2011, claiming it was bias towards those with engineering and management studies background.

Minister of State for Personnel Jitendra Singh had last year clarified that till such time as the recommendations of the committee are received and the government subsequently takes a decision on the same, the General Studies Paper-II (also known as Civil Services Aptitude Test or CSAT) in the civil services preliminary examination will remain a qualifying paper with minimum qualifying marks fixed at 33 per cent. People can give their views on the survey by February 21.