In a significant decision, the Union Cabinet chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi today approved the creation of a National Recruitment Agency (NRA) to conduct the Common Eligibility Test (CET) for central government jobs.
A common eligibility test would enable candidates to appear once and apply to any or all the recruitment agencies for a higher level examination.
As per the Government's statement, NRA-a multi-agency will conduct a CET to screen/shortlist candidates for the Group B and C (non-technical) posts.
NRA will have representatives of the Ministry of Railways, Ministry of Finance/Department of Financial Services, the Staff Selection Commission (SSC), Railway Recruitment Boards (RRBs) and Institute of Banking Personnel Selection.
"The CET score of the candidate shall be valid for a period of three years from the date of declaration of the result. The best of the valid scores shall be deemed to be the current score of the candidate", said government.
It added there would not be a restriction on the number of attempts to be taken by a candidate to appear in the CET subject to the upper age limit.
Relaxation in the upper age limit will be given to candidates of SC/ST/OBC and other categories as per the extant policy of the Government.
This would, according to the Centre, go a long way in mitigating the hardship of candidates who spend a considerable amount of time, money and effort preparing and giving these examinations every year.
Further, NRA will conduct a separate CET each for the three levels of graduate, higher secondary (12th pass) and the matriculate (10th pass) candidates for those non-technical posts to which recruitment is presently carried out by the Staff Selection Commission (SSC), the Railway Recruitment Boards (RRBs) and by the Institute of Banking Personnel Selection (IBPS).
Based on the screening done at the CET score level, final selection for recruitment shall be made through separate specialised Tiers (II, III etc) of examination which shall be conducted by the respective recruitment agencies. The curriculum for this test would be common as would be the standard.
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