CDS (II) 2024 General Knowledge · Question 48 of 120

Correct — B, Employment in private sector is facilitated in all the districts, particularly 117 aspirational districts. That is the answer carried for this paper, and it does not survive checking, so read this card for the facts rather than for the letter. The National Recruitment Agency was approved by the Union Cabinet on 19 August 2020 to conduct a Common Eligibility Test that screens and shortlists candidates for Group B non-gazetted and Group C non-technical posts in the central government, replacing the separate preliminary examinations then held by the Staff Selection Commission, the Railway Recruitment Boards and the Institute of Banking Personnel Selection. That is exactly the description in option (a). The announcement did speak of the 117 aspirational districts, but in a different connection — the agency was to open examination centres in every district, with special attention to those districts, so that candidates would not have to travel far to sit the test. It said nothing about facilitating employment in the private sector, which is not the agency's function. Option (c) and option (d) are plainly wrong: the agency dates from 2020, not 2014, and it has no constitutional status.

• (a)It is a body to conduct Common Eligibility Test (CET) to shortlist the candidates for vacancies under 'Group B' and 'Group C' of the Government. — This is the statement that matches the Cabinet decision of 19 August 2020 — a Common Eligibility Test to shortlist candidates for Group B and Group C posts — and on the published record it is the one that should be marked correct. It is set out here as the honest alternative rather than as an error.
• (c)It was set up in 2014. — The agency was proposed in the Union Budget speech of 1 February 2020 and approved by the Cabinet on 19 August 2020. Nothing was set up in 2014.
• (d)It has been accorded Constitutional status in 2021. — The National Recruitment Agency has no constitutional status. It is an executive body; constitutional status in the recruitment field belongs to the Union Public Service Commission and the State Public Service Commissions under Article 315.

Before the Common Eligibility Test, a candidate for a clerical or comparable central post had to sit a separate preliminary examination for each recruiting agency, on different dates and in different towns, paying a fee each time. The National Recruitment Agency was created to hold one screening test whose score would be accepted by the participating agencies for a fixed period, after which each agency would hold its own specialised second-stage examination. The reform is administrative rather than constitutional: the recruiting bodies remain in place and the agency sits ahead of them.

The item is a good example of why the aspirational-districts detail matters. It is genuinely part of the announcement, but attached to examination centres, not to private-sector jobs, and an option that keeps the number while changing the subject is the classic way an examiner or a solution can go astray. The other two wrong statements are easier — a body proposed in the Budget of February 2020 cannot have been set up in 2014, and constitutional status in recruitment belongs to the public service commissions under Article 315. Present-day line: the Common Eligibility Test had not been rolled out when this paper was written, and the agency's own literature described its examination centres and three levels of test — graduate, higher secondary and matriculate — rather than a live examination calendar.

• The Union Cabinet approved the National Recruitment Agency on 19 August 2020, following the Budget announcement of 1 February 2020.
• The Common Eligibility Test screens and shortlists candidates for Group B non-gazetted and Group C non-technical posts in the central government.
• Three separate tests were envisaged, for graduate, higher secondary and matriculate levels.
• The agency was to establish examination centres in every district, about a thousand in all, with special attention to the 117 aspirational districts, so candidates would not have to travel outside their district.
• Constitutional status in the field of recruitment belongs to the Union and State Public Service Commissions under Article 315, not to this agency.

• Letting a correct number carry an incorrect claim; the 117 aspirational districts belong to the examination-centre commitment, not to private-sector employment.
• Confusing an executive body with a constitutional one; only the public service commissions have constitutional status in recruitment.
• Assuming the Common Eligibility Test replaces the final selection; it replaces only the first screening stage.

As a single-correct-statement item on a new institution, with one option carrying a real detail attached to the wrong subject.

No directly related past PYQ was found.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The Common Eligibility Test of the National Recruitment Agency was designed to screen candidates for which categories of central government posts?

  • (a)Group A posts
  • (b)Group B non-gazetted and Group C non-technical posts
  • (c)Only posts in the Railways
  • (d)All India Services posts

  Answer(b) Group B non-gazetted and Group C non-technical posts — the categories named in the Cabinet decision of 19 August 2020.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Constitutional status in the field of public recruitment in India is enjoyed by which one of the following?

  • (a)The Staff Selection Commission
  • (b)The Union Public Service Commission
  • (c)The National Recruitment Agency
  • (d)The Railway Recruitment Boards

  Answer(b) The Union Public Service Commission — established under Article 315, unlike the executive bodies listed alongside it.