UPPSC 2021 Prelims GS Paper-I · Question 123 of 150

Correct — B, 2004. The Committee on Civil Services Reforms chaired by Prakash Chandra (P.C.) Hota — a former Chairman of the Union Public Service Commission — was constituted by the Government of India in 2004 (February 2004) and submitted its report the same year. It recommended reforms to recruitment (including a relook at age limits and number of attempts), performance appraisal, mid-career training and 'domain' assignment of civil servants. Hence the correct year is 2004.

• (a)2003 — Wrong — 2003 is the near-miss year candidates often pick; the Hota Committee was actually set up in 2004, not 2003.
• (c)2005 — Wrong — 2005 is the year the Second Administrative Reforms Commission (chaired by Veerappa Moily) was constituted, not the Hota Committee.
• (d)2006 — Wrong — by 2006 the Hota Committee had already reported (2004); no civil-services-reforms committee of this name was constituted in 2006.

The P.C. Hota Committee (2004) was a government committee on Civil Services Reforms, headed by Prakash Chandra Hota, an ex-UPSC Chairman. It examined the recruitment, training, performance management and accountability of the higher civil services and suggested modernising measures — part of a long line of civil-service-reform bodies in India.

This is a date-recall question, so anchor it to neighbours: Hota Committee = 2004; the Second Administrative Reforms Commission (Moily) = 2005; the Baswan Committee on the civil-services exam = 2016. Pinning Hota to 2004 also separates it from the 2003 distractor placed to catch approximate memory.

• P.C. Hota Committee on Civil Services Reforms was constituted in 2004 and reported the same year.
• It was chaired by Prakash Chandra Hota, a former Chairman of the UPSC.
• Focus areas: recruitment, performance appraisal, training and domain assignment of civil servants.
• It preceded the Second Administrative Reforms Commission (2005, chaired by M. Veerappa Moily).

• Confusing the Hota Committee (2004) with the Second ARC (2005) or the Baswan Committee (2016)
• Picking 2003 from approximate memory — the committee was constituted in 2004

UPPSC & UPSC ask 'which committee/year' for reform bodies — memorise the chairperson-year pairs (Hota-2004, Moily/2nd ARC-2005, Baswan-2016).

No directly related past PYQ was found.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The P.C. Hota Committee (2004) was concerned with which of the following?

  • (a)Centre-State financial relations
  • (b)Civil Services Reforms
  • (c)Electoral reforms
  • (d)Judicial reforms

  Answer(b) Civil Services Reforms — it reviewed recruitment, appraisal and training of the civil services.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The Second Administrative Reforms Commission, set up in 2005, was chaired by

  • (a)P.C. Hota
  • (b)M. Veerappa Moily
  • (c)K. Hanumanthaiah
  • (d)B.S. Baswan

  Answer(b) M. Veerappa Moily — chairman of the Second ARC (2005); its first chairman later, Moily led most of its reports.