One more chance for civil service aspirants

Chennai: Civil service aspirants and trainers term the Union government’s decision to allow 2011 candidates a second chance this year as “belated.” Anbarasu Rajarathinam, a civil service aspirant who took the exam in 2011, said the Union government’s decision could have come early. “It will be tough for a person to prepare after four years.

Many would have already lost their spirit and they could have also joined some other job. However, this will be good news for those for whom 2011 was their last chance: now they can take up the exam again,” said Rajarathinam, who will take up the exam again this year as he has not exhausted his number of attempts.

The pattern of civil services (preliminary) examination was changed from 2011. The government’s decision on Thursday comes in the wake of protests by several civil service aspirants about the pattern of CSAT, which, according to them, puts rural students at a disadvantage. The Centre on Thursday said an expert committee will be constituted to comprehensively examine various issues raised from time to time like eligibility, syllabus, scheme and pattern of civil services examination.

Till such time the government takes decision on the recommendation of the committee, the general studies Paper-II (CSAT) in the civil services preliminary examination will remain a qualifying paper with minimum marks fixed at 33 per cent. Founder-director of Ganesh’s IAS academy S. Ganesa Subramanian said it will now be enough for a candidate to score 66 marks out of 200 marks in CSAT. “Only if a student qualifies in CSAT then his General Studies (GS) paper will be evaluated. A student’s score in GS will decide his cut-off in the civil services exam,” he said.