With the exam conducting body Maharashtra Public Service Commission (MPSC) announcing that the State Service Preliminary exam will not be postponed under any circumstances and scheduling it on January 23 as decided, MPSC aspirants are racing against the clock to prepare themselves for the examination.
The examination was expected to be held on January 2, 2022, however, it was postponed due to the rise in Covid cases. Officials from the Commission have now informed in an official statement that the examination will be held on January 23.
"Some of us hoped for the exams to happen in March as it would have given us more time since the rise in Covid cases has also affected us," said Kunal Kamble, an MPSC aspirant from Nagpur who is appearing for the Group B pre-exam which consists of a General Studies Paper and Civil Services Aptitude Test (CSAT), making a total of 400 marks. "After Covid-19 hit, I was left without work and started looking at MPSC exams as my way to job security. For the past two years, I haven't been able to access the reading material required for such exams since I live in a remote area where resources are scarce," the 35-year old Kunal added.
Some MPSC candidates are looking forward to the Mains in June, which generally has both descriptive and objective papers, with six papers in total followed by an interview.
"With subjects such as Geography, History, and Economics being a part of the syllabus for MPSC exams, I expect the exams to be easier for me so that I can look ahead at Mains," said another aspirant, who also cautioned about candidates spending their hard-earned money for enrolling in MPSC classes in Pune since they are paying anywhere between Rs.30 to 50k for basic subjects that can be easily learned through books by famous authors. "Read B.L.Grover for History, Bipin Chandra for Polity, Laxmikanth for History, Kiran Desle for Economics and many more," the candidate recommended.
The pressure of getting married, holding a job, Covid crisis, etc. haunts many of the candidates. For some, changes in the recruitment process of other departments such as Women and Child Development prove to be a barrier in case they are not able to crack MPSC. "The sudden changes in rules for WCD department has left us dejected as it is no longer going to be direct but conducted through the state service examination thus requiring us to give prelims and mains for recruitment in the apex body which was not the case earlier," said Vishal Patil, a candidate from Pune.
To gain access to the prelims examination room for MPSC, the candidate must bring the original printed admission certificate which can be downloaded from the commission's website. Admission for the exam will not be granted without it, according to the official notification released by the exam body.
In case a candidate faces difficulty in getting the admission card, they should contact the concerned authorities through the official website https://mpsc.gov.in/.
