The government is not considering any proposal to grant additional attempts to aspirants of the civil services examination for 2022, the Rajya Sabha was informed on Thursday.

The issue of granting age relaxation and extra attempts to the candidates in the civil services exam because of the Covid-19 pandemic had been brought before the Supreme Court through a writ petitions filed by some aspirants, minister of state for personnel Jitendra Singh said in a written reply.

Based on the judgments passed by the apex court, the matter has been considered and it has not been found feasible to change the existing provisions regarding the number of attempts and the age limit, he said.

“In view of the above, no such proposal is under consideration,” said Singh, replying to a query whether “the government would consider giving additional attempts for the year 2022”.

The civil services examination is conducted annually to select officers to the Indian Administrative Service (IAS), Indian Foreign Service (IFS) and the Indian Police Service (IPS), among others.

Deputation

States have not been “sponsoring adequate number of officers for central deputation”, which has prompted changes in the service rules, minister Singh informed the Rajya Sabha on Thursday in a written reply.