(UPSC), the government said on Wednesday said that there is no proposal to relax the upper age limit and the number of attempts for a candidate appearing in the civil service examinations conducted by Union Public Service Commission(UPSC).
Minister of State for Personnel V Narayanasamy said some representations or references have been received from various quarters seeking relaxation in the upper age limit and the number of attempts, as prescribed in Civil Services Examination (CSE) Rules, 2013 consequent to format change in the exams. In the revised scheme the overall number of papers to be taken by a candidate remains the same.
The number of optional subjects has been reduced from two to only one thereby bringing down the number of papers from four to two and the number of papers for general studies has been increased from two to four, he said. "Thus, no additional stress is envisaged on the candidates on account of these changes. There is no proposal to relax fresh attempts and consequently relaxation in the upper age limit," Narayanasamy told Lok Sabha in a written reply.
As per CSE Rules, 2013, a candidate must have attained the age of 21 years and must not have attained the upper age of 30 years may apply for the civil service examination to choose IAS, IPS and IFS among others. However, the upper age limit is relaxable upto a maximum of five years for candidates belonging to Scheduled Caste or a Scheduled Tribe categories and upto a maximum of three years for candidates of OBC category among others.
The upper age limit is also relaxable upto a maximum of five years if a candidate had ordinarily been domiciled in Jammu ~~amp;amp; Kashmir during January 1, 1980 to December 31, 1989. It can also be relaxed upto a maximum of three years in the case of defence services personnel disabled in operations during hostilities with any foreign country or in a disturbed area and released as a consequence thereof.
There is also a relaxation in upper age upto a maximum of 10 years in the case of blind, deaf-mute and orthopaedically handicapped candidates besides other categories, the rules said. In reply to another question, Narayanasamy said there was no proposal to include Persian and Arabic languages in the examination.
A committee under the chairmanship of former UGC Chairman Prof Arun S Nigavekar has recommended to Commission to keep the literatures of those languages in the list of subjects to be available as an optional in the scheme of Civil Services (main) Examination, which are presently included in the eight schedule to the Constitution, besides English. The recommendation was approved by the government.
"The Persian and Arabic language not being a part of the languages included in the eight schedule of the Constitution of India do not figure in the list of language subjects. Presently, there is no proposal to review the above decision," the Minister said.
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