Would-be bureaucrats give tips on cracking the 'triple A' test

Students at the Bangalore Institute of Technology (BIT) got an insight into the hard work that goes in cracking the union civil services examination.

On Saturday, Rajya Vokkaligara Sangha, which runs the college, felicitated 16 candidates from the Vokkaliga community who cleared the tough exams to join the Indian Administrative Service (IAS), the Indian Police Service (IPS), the Indian Revenue Service (IRS) and the Indian Forest Service (IFoS).

At the interactive session, D B Gunank, who has made it to the IFS, said the exam conducted by Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) could be described as a triple A test. “The preliminary exam is the Aptitude Test, Mains is the Analysis Test and Interview is the Attitude Test,” he said.

The successful candidates allayed doubts that medical or engineering graduates would find it difficult to clear the exams. Nine out of 10 successful candidates present at the programme were engineers.

Retired IAS officer M K Shankar Lingegowda said the number of candidates cracking the entrance exam was higher than before. He reminded the new civil servants about challenges faced by bureaucrats in present times. “We are living in a time of political and social conflict. You (civil servants) should be cautious. More than external threat, we have internal threat to our security like never before,” said the retired bureaucrat.

He reminded them that assertion of identities caused conflict, and asked them to read Nobel laureate Amartya Sen’s book ‘Identity and Violence: The Illusion of Destiny’. He asked them not to buckle under pressure and to boldly face the challenges. “Governance is different from political parties. There is a robust system in place which works accordingly,” he said.