UPSC aspirant answers some 'wrong' questions about 2017 Civil Services Prelims
The Supreme Court has recently agreed to hear a petition filed by a law student against the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC). According to the petitioner, a couple of questions asked in the General Studies paper in UPSC Civil Services Preliminary examination (held on June 18) were ambiguous.
Here, by ambiguous, the petitioner claimed that the "examination paper had questions with multiple answers and many of them could have been answered in two different ways based on the subjective interpretation of the examinees".
In Prelims, objective questions are asked in which four options are given and naturally one of them is correct. But due to some ambiguity, in a couple of questions, two answers seemed to be correct instead of one.
In simple words, different interpretations are possible and therefore, different answers.
In fact, this is not new for the UPSC to ask such ambiguous questions in the Prelims. Every year, there are few such questions. But this year, the ambiguity seems to have increased. So much so that one question had different historians coming up with different opinions in the past.
Let me try to explain it.
This year, a question was asked on the Indus Valley civilisation. Instead of going into the nuances, I would make it simple. The answer to that question depends on the fact whether there was evidence of a horse found in the Indus Valley civilisation or not. While some historians say that the evidence of the horse is very much present, others disagree. They all have tried to prove their point of view by giving their own logic and assumptions in their books. Now, people preparing for the civil services read different books. Therefore, candidates in the examination ticked different choices for this question, which in my opinion, is not wrong.
You might think why am I raising such a hue and cry over a few questions? Truth be told, even one "wrong" question could lead to disastrous results for someone.
There are two papers in the Prelims. Each paper is of 200 marks. But the second paper is qualifying in nature (which means, one must score minimum marks in this paper that is 33 per cent to qualify but whose marks won’t be considered to finalise the list of candidates eligible to write Mains exam). So, basically your fate depends on 200 marks only (the first paper).
The cut-off for last two years has been around 110 marks. The level of competition in the examination can be estimated by the fact that almost half of the candidates who get selected in the prelims remain within the 10-marks window from the cut-off.
While one question is of two marks, negative marking costs one-third extra. This means an incorrect question would make you lose 2.67 marks. So, even one or two incorrect questions have enough potential to thrash approximately 15 per cent or 25 per cent candidates out of the list of candidates who get to write the Mains (exams). Isn’t that a big cause of worry?
This time, at least two-three "highly ambiguous" questions were asked in the Prelims. Many aspirants claimed that six to eight questions were "wrong". That way, it seems the selection in the Prelims is getting more and more dependent on luck than talent.
The Supreme Court has agreed to hear the case on August 1. However, the problem doesn't end here. The real issue is of transparency and accountability in the civil services exam.
Challenging the arbitrary, opaque and unprofessional attitude of the UPSC towards conducting the exams. And above all, the fundamental rights of a common civil service aspirant trapped in the loop of attempts after attempts. Shouldn’t we have an effective and transparent grievance redressal mechanism for examination-related complaints of a common candidate preparing hard in a small room at Old Rajendra Nagar or Mukherjee Nagar (in Delhi).
Information like answer keys are generally released after the completion of the whole examination process, that is, about a year later.
Answer keys of last year's Prelims held on August 7, came a week after the Prelims of this year that was held on June 18. If the candidates don’t get selected in Prelims, don't they have the right to know the correct answers to the questions asked in the paper?
Or else, how would they improve? Isn’t it against the very basic principle of competition?
If you file an RTI, your RTI will be delayed deliberately. Anybody will accept defeat because most candidates don't have enough resources to fight against the UPSC. And even if they dare to file a case, the UPSC's reputation and the arguments of its invincible lawyers are bound to affect the morale of the aspirants.
You may be surprised to know that institutions such as the Public Service Commission of most of the states and the SSC not only release answer keys within a given time, but also give a chance to the candidates to challenge the questions. But UPSC aspirants don’t have such good fate.
In the same way, in the Mains (second stage of civil services exam) model-answers, copy-checking, option-parity (establishing equity among different optional subjects) are some issues which need transparency. There are many issues related to the interview process too.
Overall, there are many flaws in the entire examination system, which need proper attention.
The indifferent attitude of the government also makes this more complicated. The Baswan Committee Report, tabled a year back, has yet to be implemented.
In 2015, after an agitation by the Hindi-medium students over the Hindi translation of the question papers, Paper 2 was made qualifying in nature. At that time, the decision was perceived quite reasonable because only a few weeks were left for the Prelims, but for the next two years, the status quo on that front questions the competency of the government and the “holy cow” UPSC.
The cut-off has being calculated from just 200 marks instead of 400 marks. In the history of the Civil Services Examination, the cut-off of the preliminary exam rarely would have been calculated from the marks of only one paper, but sadly it has been in practice since the last three years. An exception has changed into a regular process.
It is true that the UPSC is one of the rare institutions of our country, whose record is almost immaculate and unblemished. But when it comes to transparency, it is definitely pathetic. It is also true that increased transparency will increase the possibility of the UPSC being dragged to the court in frivolous litigation.
But you cannot deny transparency just because this will increase the number of petitions. And if a petition is frivolous it will not stand in the court anyway. In the latest petition, the Supreme Court has agreed to hear the case, that means prima facie the apex court must have noticed some seriousness in it.
I have already cleared the Prelims. I am writing all this so that these problems get addressed. This is not just about this year's questions. Aspirants encounter such hurdles every year. That must stop!
“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”