Civil service exam results show India moving from women’s participation to women’s leadership: Union minister Jitendra Singh

NEW DELHI, May 30: An analysis of 20 all-India toppers in Civil Services Examination 2022 (CSE 2022) shows that 60% of them are women; 60% belong to the science stream even as humanities is fast catching up with the remaining 40% from this discipline; and one-fourth hail from India’s most populous state of Uttar Pradesh.
Sharing these statistics during a meeting with 20 top rankers in CSE 2022 here on Tuesday, minister of state for personnel and PMO Jitendra Singh said the fact that the first four rank-holders and 60% of the top 20 are women “is a great reflection of demographic changes happening in the last nine years of Modi government, where India is moving from women’s participation to women’s leadership”.
Three women — Ishita Kishore, Garima Lohia, Uma Harathi N — were the top three scorers in CSE 2022, repeating the trend from last year. “I hope for a hat-trick in the Civil Services Examination 2023,” Singh said in his welcome address at a meeting to felicitate CSE 2022 toppers at his North Block office here. He described the 2022 batch of civil servants as the “Batch of Change Leaders”, saying that they shall be in key positions of governance when India celebrates 100 years of Independence in 2047 “as one of the frontline countries of the world”.
Singh on Tuesday also released the IAS Civil list 2023 in an e-book format.
Sharing the profile of the 20 CSE toppers this year, the minister said there are only 8 engineers and one medico, while the rest have graduated with a humanities degree. He welcomed this change, describing it democratisation of services through optimum use of technology.
Singh also took note of the demographic change happening over the last few years and said the top 20 candidates represent a pan-India coverage, with five hailing from UP; three each from Bihar and Delhi; two each from Haryana and Jammu and Kashmir; and one each from Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Telangana and Assam.
He underlined that even candidates who did their schooling from Kendriya Vidyalaya, Navodaya School and other government schools are cracking the exam, unlike earlier when it was largely the preserve of ‘elite’ schools.
While seven of the 20 all-India toppers cleared CSE 2022 in their third attempt, five passed in the fourth attempt, four in the first attempt and one in the fifth attempt.
Singh told the prospective civil servants that there is a huge and positive change in the curricula at Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration (LBSNAA), Mussoorie — where they will do their foundational training — to bring it in line with the modern times. Apart from Mission Karmayogi and Mission Prarambh, young probationers will have a three-month stint of mentorship in the Central government before getting allocated to their respective State or Union Territory cadre. (TNN)