The Centre on Saturday said the Government will share its decision on the UPSC row at an appropriate time even as the protest against the examination pattern instensified in New Delhi and parts of Bihar.
Minister for Department of Personnel Training(DoPT) Jitendra Singh met Home Minister Rajnath Singh in New Delhi and later told reporters the conclusions of the Government’s decisions on the Arvind Varma Committee report will be shared with the stakeholders. BJP leaders and the Government are working in tandem to resolve the row over the issue. BJP General Secretary JP Nadda met the Home Minister at the latter’s residence and said the resolution of the issue “may take some time.”
He said the BJP and the Government have received “suggestions” and discussions were underway to sort out the issue as examinations were scheduled on August 26. The meeting was also attended by BJP leader Ram Madhav.A three-member committee, under the chairmanship of former Secretary of DoPT Arvind Varma, was formed in March this year to look into the demands of students for changes in the pattern of civil services examination.
The committee submitted its report to the Government on Thursday which is currently under examination.The students have been protesting in the national Capital in support of their demand to change the pattern of Civil Services Aptitude Test (CSAT) to give level-playing field to those coming from rural areas. There are two compulsory papers of 200 marks each in the preliminary examination.
These papers are also known as CSAT I and CSAT II. The CSAT-II paper carries questions on comprehension, interpersonal skills including communication skills, logical reasoning and analytical ability, decision-making and problem- solving, general mental ability and English language comprehension skills (of Class X level).
Students have been objecting to the level of aptitude, analytical and English language questions being asked in the CSAT II examination, claiming they are biased in favour of those aspirants with engineering and management background.The protesting students have also been demanding that the civil services preliminary examination, scheduled to be held on August 24, be postponed.
The country’s prestigious civil services examination is conducted by UPSC in three stages -- preliminary, main, and interview -- to choose candidates for all-India services Indian Administrative Service (IAS), Indian Forest Service (IFS) and Indian Police Service (IPS) among others.The other members of the committee, which was formed on March 14, are IAS officers R K Gupta and P K Das. R K Gupta is working as Principal Secretary to the Jammu and Kashmir Governor and P K Das is working as Joint Secretary in DoPT.
The Committee’s chairman Arvind Varma is a retired IAS officer of Uttar Pradesh cadre. He has served as DoPT Secretary between September 30, 1996 and November 30, 1998.Meanwhile, scores of National Students’ Union of India (NSUI) activists on Saturday staged a protest outside the residence of the Home Minster demanding scrapping of Civil Services Aptitude Test (CSAT).
Former Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Saturday lent his support to agitating students the examination for selection of civil servants was to judge merit and not translation capacity. Kumar urged the Centre to resolve the problem immediately as the delay was escalating the anger of students across the country.Making a common cause with protestors complaining predominance of English at the cost of Hindi and other recognised regional languages, Kumar told reporters in Patna the UPSC examination was not aimed at testing knowledge of an alien language (English) but that of merit. Kumar said translation of CSAT paper into Hindi and other languages sometimes change the meaning which is disadvantageous to students whose medium is other than English.