The Centre will give an extra chance to aspirants who had their last attempt for the Civil Services exam last year but could not appear for the exam owing to the pandemic
The Central Government on Friday agreed to give an extra chance to UPSC CSE Prelims candidates who had their last attempt for the Civil Services exam in 2020 but could not appear for the exam owing to the novel coronavirus pandemic.
The Supreme Court was hearing a plea today by Rachna Singh, a civil services aspirant, seeking an extra attempt in the UPSC exams for those candidates who had their last attempt in the exam was held on 4 October last year.
Read the conditions laid down by the Centre here:
1) Relaxation, only to the extent of providing one extra attempt for Civil Service Examination (CSE), specifically limited to CSE-2021, may be granted to only those candidates who appeared for CSE-2020 as their last permissible attempt and are otherwise not age-barred from appearing in CSE-2021.
2) No relaxation shall be granted for CSE-2021 to those candidates who have not exhausted their permissible number of attempts or to those candidates who are otherwise age-barred from appearing in CSE-2021 as per the prescribed age limits of different categories, or to any other candidate for any other reason whatsoever.
3) This relaxation for the candidates and to the extent as prescribed above, shall be a one-time relaxation only and shall apply only for appearing in CSE-2021 and shall not be treated as a precedent.
4) The relaxation provided at Point 1, shall not create any vested right whatsoever or any other purported right on the ground of parity or otherwise.
Notification of Civil Services exam 2021
The Civil Services preliminary exam was held on 4 October last year. Initially, the UPSC exam was scheduled in May but had to postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic.
According to the data shared by the government, as many as 4,86,952 candidates had appeared for the exam on 4 October.
Meanwhile, the main exam of Civil Services 2020 is over. The exam was held from 8 to 17 January. More than 10,000 candidates were shortlisted for the main exam on the basis of the marks obtained in the prelims exam.
The notification of Civil Services exam 2021 is scheduled to be released on 10 February.
Aspirants seek extra UPSC prelims 2021 attempt
Many candidates came together to file a petition in the top court seeking an extra attempt for the UPSC civil services prelims 2021 exam. These candidates had appeared for their last attempt for the exam last year and want another chance at the test.
These UPSC aspirants argued that due to the novel coronavirus pandemic, a lot of students could not give their best during the exam last year and thus, deserve another chance to appear for the UPSC prelims 2021 and seek a post in the Union Public Service Commission.