New Delhi, June 13: Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) has successfully conducted the preliminary exam for Civil Services on brand new pattern CSAT-2011 across the nation on Sunday. Over 4 lakh aspirants applied for the exam, out of which around 12,000 will be selected for the next round.
UPSC changed the examination pattern this year onwards by introducing new aptitude test involving mathematical and reasoning skill in place of previous subject based optional paper. However, the apex exam conducting body for central government of India preferred to keep the general studies paper in its old format.
Each paper was having 200 marks and the stipulated time duration was 120 minutes (2 hrs) for each.
Paper-I followed more or less the previous trend of UPSC PT, however number of question has been reduced to 100 from earlier 150 covering General Science, History of India including the Indian national movement, current events of national and international importance, Indian and world geography, and Indian polity and governance.
The GS paper was of objective type with multiple answer choice. Many questions were asked from the newer areas like economic and social development and general issues on, biodiversity, environmental ecology and ecological changes.
Paper-II, the aptitude test paper, is the new development. The newly introduced paper had 80 question from General Mental Ability, Comprehension (General and English), Interpersonal and Communication Skills, Basic Numeracy, Decision-making and Problem-solving, Logical Reasoning and Analytical Ability.
English comprehension part in the Paper-II was bit tricky for Hindi belt students as their was no translation option. The new pattern definitely favors students from technical background.
Students, who appeared in the exam, shown mixed reaction on the level of questions asked in today's exam. Experts are off opinion that the cut-off marks could go up slightly as second paper was relatively easy as comapred to first paper.
Praveen Kumar Jha an applicant of CSAT-2011, who belongs to History background, told the Goindocal.com that the first paper was on predicted line but Paper II was bit complex because the aptitude section was tough to handle in stipulated time given by the UPSC.
Raman Sinha and Ashutosh Singh who belongs to engineering background said that the Paper II was good for them but they had faced some difficulty to tackle the tricky questions in Paper I.
It seems from the students reactions that the science background people were found themselves comfortable with the Paper II and the students belongs to Humanity background were comfortable with the Paper I.
The result of CSAT-2011 will be announced after combining the marks of Paper I and paper II so UPSC had tried their best to balance the sections by not giving additional advantage to some section of students.The result of the CSAT-2011 is expected to be announced by the first week of August.
