Amidst protest and uproar over Civil Services Aptitude Test (CSAT) conducted by the UPSC for all India services, the Centre on Wednesday requested the Opposition to allow the conduct of the scheduled preliminary exam on August 24 and agreed to hold an all-party meeting to discuss the row.
The matter rocked the Rajya Sabha again with members from CPI-M, CPI, SP and BSP staging a walkout expressing dissatisfaction over Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs Prakash Javadekar’s statement on the issue.
Referring to the demands of some Opposition members and a suggestion given to him by senior SP member Ramgopal Yadav for all party-meet, Javadekar said, “An all-party meeting will definitely take place. If there is need, more such meetings can take place.” BJP’s Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi Naqvi said Samajwadi Party’s senior leader Ramgopal Yadav had suggested to him regarding an all-party meeting on the issue.
Naqvi also took a jibe at Congress over the issue saying the NDA Government is trying to fill the ditches dug by thre Congress-led UPA prompting vehement protest from Opposition members led by Renuka Chowdhary of Congress.
Maintaining that it was a sensitive issue, which has many aspects, Javadekar said a discussion is needed to determine on whether a major reform of the examination pattern of the UPSC is required. “let us give our best wishes to all those, who are taking the August 24 exam,” he said.
Reacting sharply to the suggestion, Sitaram Yechury (CPI-M) said the Government should take a decision on that basis of opinion already expressed by the political parties rather than calling an all-party meeting.
“Do not apply delaying tactics. Government should say what is the status quo...This is not satisfactory. That is why we are staging a walk out,” Yechury said before joining members of SP, BSP and CPI in the walkout.
P Rajeeve of the same party wanted to know the “status quo” asking whether the statement given by the Minister of DoPT Jitender Singh earlier on the issue now remains valid after Javadekar’s remarks and whether there is a UPSC notification in this regard Deputy Chairman P J Kurien tried to pacify the members saying the Minister has not said that the statement is invalid.
Congress member Rajiv Shukla cautioned that since governance is getting complicated day by day, it will not be good if incompetent IAS officers are appointed due to politics over the issue. Sharad Yadav JD(U) leader said the CSAT exam should be made qualifying with equal weightage to all Indian languages.
Several civil services aspirants have been protesting demanding changes in the pattern of CSAT citing alleged wrong translation and level of questions, saying they favour aspirants coming from technical and management educational background. RJD MP Pappu Yadav and his supporters joined the agitation outside the BJP headquarters and raised slogans against BJP and CSAT exam.
Satish Chandra Mishra (BSP) said the formula suggested by the DoPT Minister has “further complicated” the matter and he also castigated Congress on the issue reminding that the CSAT had begun in 2011 when they were in power.
TMC member Derek O’Brien said the government has come with a “knee-jerk reaction in a hurry” which has further compounded the problem. Maintaining that a solution to the problem cannot be found out by August 24, O’Brien said there is need to have more dialogue and discussion as “some say CSAT is very good and some say CSAT is bad”. He asked for a “clear, reliable and genuine assurance” from the Government in this regard.