Results of the first-ever Kerala Administrative Service (KAS) exam have been announced, with women bagging the top ranks. The examination was conducted by Kerala Public Service Commission (PSC).
Malini S emerged topper in the first stream while Nandana S Pillai clinched the second rank with Gopika Udayan and Athira SV in the third and fourth positions respectively, PSC Chairman MK Sakeer told reporters while announcing the results in Thiruvananthapuram, on Friday, October 8. Akhika Chacko and Anoop Kumar were the toppers in the second and third streams respectively, he said.
According to PSC, Stream 1 consists of graduate candidates belonging to the age group of 21-32 years who are directly recruited. Stream 2 consists of non-gazetted government employees up to the age of 40, while Stream 3 comprises gazetted employees of the same age category, it said.
The Kerala Public Service Commission received a total of 5.77 lakh applications across the three streams when the notification for the KAS Junior Officers was issued in November 2019. As many as 3,713 were shortlisted for the main exam and of them, 582 qualified for the interview held in September this year.
A total of 533 candidates were included in the rank list of the three streams and the list would be valid for one year.
The KAS came into force on January 1, 2017. KAS has been formed with the aim to boost employment as well as give a new lease of life to the administrative system in the state. PSC Chairman Sakeer said that the KAS is a significant step towards moulding a new generation of middle-level employees in the State civil service.
The KAS preliminary examination held in February this year had kicked off a row after a section of the candidates alleged that five questions that appeared in the exam were copied from study material published by a private coaching centre. One of the questions, they alleged, was the one where the coaching centre had misprinted a word. The same was reproduced with the mistake in the KAS question paper.
With PTI Inputs