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The country’s most prestigious Civil Services Examination (UPSC Civil Services Examination) has once again come under the scanner for major legal controversies. The matter has reached the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) regarding the correctness of the questions asked in this year’s preliminary examination (Prelims) of the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC). While objections were raised on a few questions in the initial phase, now this scope has increased to 27 questions directly. The candidates allege that many of the answers in the Commission’s provisional answer key are either factually incorrect or contain gross ambiguity. After this legal tussle and the reply sought by the Tribunal, a new hope has arisen among hundreds of youth across the country who were out of the Mains race by a very small margin of marks.
After the completion of the General Studies (GS Paper-1) and CSAT papers of the Civil Services Preliminary Examination conducted by the Union Public Service Commission, the controversies started when the Commission released its official provisional answer key. When the bright students and various candidate groups who appeared for the examination compared the official answer keys with standard government books, primary sources and statutory provisions, they found several major differences. Students allege that many of the answers decided by the Commission are either contrary to the prevalent and authentic textbooks or there is no correct answer in the options for some questions. Regarding this, the candidates had earlier lodged their objections on the Commission’s portal, but when satisfactory results were not received from there and the examination result was declared, the matter went to CAT for justice.
The 27 questions mainly raised under this legal petition include very complex topics related to history, polity, sports and current affairs. For example, a question related to the rules of Grand Slam tennis tournaments, a question related to the process of ‘Zero FIR’ under the Indian Civil Defense Code (BNSS), and a question related to the means of agriculture and irrigation (such as ‘Ashma Chakra’ and ‘Ahava’) during ancient history, i.e. the Rigvedic period, have claimed high technical and linguistic ambiguity. Candidates also say that due to the difference in the selection of words in the English and Hindi medium question papers, there was confusion in choosing the correct answer, due to which they lost valuable marks.
Considering the seriousness of the matter, the Principal Bench of the Central Administrative Tribunal, while hearing this petition, has officially issued a notice to the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC). The Tribunal has asked the Commission to clarify what was the view taken by the Expert Committees of the Commission on the objections raised by the candidates and if the objections were rejected, what were the concrete grounds behind the same. The lawyers appearing for the petitioners argue that such repeated factual errors and ambiguities in the country’s biggest examination are directly playing with the future of the candidates. While fixing the date of next hearing in this matter, CAT has sought a detailed reply from the Commission, on which the eyes of the administrative services candidates across the country are fixed.
Those who understand the pattern of Civil Services Examination know well that in the Prelims stage, the difference of just one or two marks becomes a wall between selection and shortlisting. The petitioners estimate that due to the impact of these 27 disputed questions and the negative marking associated with them, there may be a change of more than 16 marks in the total marks. Many promising students who missed the cutoff by just a few decimals or marks are hoping for justice through this legal battle. If the Commission, on the direction of the Tribunal, re-reviews these disputed questions, either excludes them from evaluation (deletes them) or issues revised results on the basis of correct answers, it may lead to a major change in the final scorecard of the examination and the list of qualified candidates.