Big Breaking: Will UPSC Prelims 2020 be Postponed Again?

The UPSC prelims which were earlier scheduled for 31st May 2020 got postponed to 4th October due to the global COVID-19 pandemic. The Union Public Service Commission recently released admit cards for the preliminary exam.

Will UPSC prelims 2020 be postponed again? It is merely two weeks left now for the preliminary exam to take place but thousands of students are vouching for postponing the examination.

Due to the massive outbreak of the coronavirus outbreak, more than 20,000 aspirants have signed the petition asking for a postponement of the UPSC IAS prelims exam. Many of the students have held an inadequate transport facility to be one of the major reasons behind seeking this postponement.

Will UPSC Prelims 2020 be Delayed?

The Supreme Court, on 24th September 2020 agreed on hearing a plea asking postponement of the UPSC 2020 prelims. The petition was filed through Advocate Alakh Alok Srivastava. Mr Srivastava prays for the postponement of the civil services preliminary exam by two to three months and also requests the court to quash the UPSC released revised calendar where the 2020 prelims are scheduled to be held on 4th October all over the nation.

It is stated by the petitioners that the decision of the Union Public Service Commission to conduct the preliminary exam on the pre-scheduled date violates the rights of the petitioners to practice their chosen profession/occupation of serving the public under Article 19(1)(g).

“About 6 lakh aspirants (including the Petitioners herein) are likely to appear in the captioned Civil Services (Preliminary) Examination, which is a 7 Hours Offline Examinations, in very few centres at 72 Cities across India. Meanwhile, COVID-19 cases are increasing in India at an alarming rate of more than 80 thousand cases per day. The deadly pandemic COVID-19 has already affected more than 40 Lakh people in India and the situation is worsening by every passing day.” – Plea filed in Supreme Court

News regarding UPSC CSE Date Postponed

On 24th September 2020 the Supreme Court, on a plea to postpone the UPSC prelims 2020, issued a notice to the Union Public Service Commission and the Centre. Justice A.M. Khanwilkar and Justice Sanjiv Khanna from Court No. 5 sent the notice.

Aspirants who want the UPSC CSE date to be postponed are seeing this notice as a ray of hope and are waiting eagerly for 28th September as on that date the matter will be heard.

Hashtag ‘Postpone_Karo_UPSC’ is trending all over the internet by aspirants demanding for UPSC prelims to get postponed once again. Many are using the various social media platforms to raise their voice and show protest against the upcoming UPSC CSE prelims date, while some of the aspirants have also gone a step ahead by starting hunger strikes.

Priya Kumari, an engineering graduate aspirant from Bihar is topping the UPSC prelims postponed news as she has chosen the way of a hunger strike to show her protest.

Also Read : What is the Motto of NSS? How Many NSS Regional Centres are There in India?

Will UPSC Prelims 2020 be Postponed Again?

In the past few months, many similar please seeking the postponement of exams like JEE Main, National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (UG), CBSE Board exam, chartered accountants, college final year exams etc came in front of the Supreme Court. In most of the cases, the Supreme Court has advised taking safety measures for minimising the spread of Coronavirus among the candidates and ordered them to carry on with the examinations.

Even though thousands of aspirants are hoping to hear the UPSC prelims postponed news from the decision-makers, the decision of the court regarding the previously appealed exams is also scaring them.

Why Aspirants want the UPSC Prelims to get Postponed Again?

Lack of public transport and concern regarding safety are the major reasons behind the demand of the aspirants to postpone the CSE prelims. There are many aspirants who have witnessed the death of their family members due to COVID-19. They are frightened.

Many of the candidates also feel that there is no hurry to conduct the examination amidst a situation where the daily cases are growing rapidly.

There are also questions coming up regarding those exam centres which are presently within containment zones and also regarding the candidates coming from containment zones as the health ministry has instructed to not allow aspirants coming from those zones.

Candidates all over the nation are showing protest and want the 2020 UPSC prelims to get postponed again due to many factors. Some of the candidates are also demanding the state governments to allow public transports like buses or trains for candidates to come to the city in case the examination doesn’t get postponed.

Conclusion

Many aspirants who have signed the petition are fearing that due to the lack of transport, fear of death and falling ill, they might not be able to appear on the exam after preparing for it so hard.

The plea to get the UPSC prelims postponed again highlights that the UPSC exam is different from any academic examination, so even if the test gets postponed there will be no loss of session.

The plea added, “Despite alarming spurt in Covid-19 pandemic, UPSC did not increase the number of Examination Centres, resulting into a situation where many candidates from rural areas will be forced to travel for around 300-400 Kilometres, in order to reach to their Examination Centres and there will be a high probability of such aspirants, getting affected while using public transportation for such travel”.