Chief Secretary is the highest administrative office in any state. In an exclusive interaction with fachcha.com Delhi’s Chief Secretary Rakesh Mehta, a 1975 batch IAS officer and alumnus of St. Stephen’s College, JNU and London School of Economics, told about the examination pattern for civil services examination during his time in early 80’s and how it was difficult for an engineer and doctors to get entry in the most prestigious government services. Excerpts:

fachcha.com: How was the Civil Services Examination during 70-80’s?
Rakesh Mehta: It was difficult at that time too as it is today. But there was no preliminary test. There were just written test and interview. There were seven papers for the Indian Administrative Services and five papers for other services including IPS. If a candidate opted for IAS he had to appear in all seven papers and had to qualify in all. Otherwise, he had to clear just five papers.

fachcha.com: How difficult and different were the papers from today’s papers?
Rakesh Mehta: I can not say about the comparison. But the level of difficulty can be understood by the fact that there were three papers in a day, one of three hours and other two of two hours each. In a way candidates had to write seven hours in a day for the examination. Some of them could not even bear it. Some candidates used to faint due to the examination pressure. While some others used to leave the examination in the middle.

fachcha.com: Whether entry of engineers and doctors was possible? What was the situation of language?
Rakesh Mehta: Yes, it was possible but they had to complete their graduation from normal stream. Nobody with the qualification of B.Tech or BE or MBBS was allowed to appear in the examination. Today the situation has been changed a lot. Today, even a graduate in anatomy can appear in the Civil Services examination.

fachcha.com: What about language?
Rakesh Mehta: Today you can appear in the examination with any language even with Sindhi, Sanskrit but situation was completely different at that time. There were few language papers available for the candidates. Four or five language papers were there and most of them were foreign like Russian, English etc.

fachcha.com: What is your view about the proposed changes in the examination system?
Rakesh Mehta: I have just heard about it. But I am unable to comment about it.

fachcha.com: In some way the proposed system will follow the pattern of IIM-CAT? Do you think that it will work to select right candidate for the Civil Services?
Rakesh Mehta: See selection process for civil services has always been rigorous and comprehensive. If IIM can get best candidates for management through it why not UPSC.

fachcha.com: But IIM teaches corporate governance while the Civil Services is about public governance?
Rakesh Mehta: That is true. But UPSC conducts tests at various levels to select a candidate for civil services. There are mechanisms like main examination and interview or personality test also to judge a suitable candidate.