POSTED BY KN RAGHUPATHY
Going by the chit-chat and claims and counter claims on the social media it is certain that SSC has sent a proposal to the DoLT, Government of India, for revamping the Examinations pattern of the Combined Graduate Level Examination.
If DoLT fast tracks PM's approval will be forthcoming shortly. During the UPA regime it used to take 6 weeks for PM's approval. The present PM is different and faster approval can be expected.
Again, going by the inanity of SSC in the last four years to conduct large examinations- either offline or online without major complaints, I expect Tier I to be only QUALIFYING. It will mean that marks of Tier I will not be considered for final merit. It will be only a shortlisting preliminary examination.
The Main Examination format will obviously change consequently. But, SSC cannot look beyond the four subjects of General Intelligence and Reasoning, Arithmetic, General Awareness and English in the Main Examination.
I am quite sure that the following issues would have been considered by the SSC in formulating the format of the Main Examination.
1. Whether the weightage given to English should reduce and whether English should be only qualifying. BJP believes in One Nation, One Language theory and I will not be surprised if this happens. Over 50% of candidates selected out of CGL end up in non Hindi speaking states and the quality of work will suffer. But dogma kids job requirement very often. Even with the current weghtage to English at least 70% of the selected candidates are from Hindi speaking states.
2. Whether the Arithmetic paper should continue to have Algebra, Geometry and Trigonometry.
3. Whether General AwRenrss should be included in the mains. If Tier I will be qualifying Tier II will have General Awareness.
4. Whether Tier II should have General Intelligence and Reasoning. I would personally like to have it in the Mains though I am not sure whether the present dispensation will like it.
5. Whether Mains should have only descriptive papers. Despite the proven aberrations in evaluation of descriptive papers in the past and so recent, there is a strong lobby in favour of descriptive papers as it will generate continuous income to select retired middle Evelyn officers. But, too much emphasis on descriptive papers will go against Digital India concept.
6. Whether the Descriptive Paper in current Tier III should be in Tier II or mains itself to save time.
During my interaction with large groups of job aspirants at Delhi, Lucknow, Allahabad, Varanasi etc in the last two months I had shared these issues with them.
My advice to the students is to continue preparation for Tier I, with the hope that Mains will have any three or all the four subjects of Tier I.
Many of my followers have asked me about National Career Service and One Nation, one Examination. I will post on them separately.