UPSC and Northeast

Only about nine or ten candidates from the Northeastern region have found a place among the 958 candidates recommended by the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) in its results for the Civil Services Examination 2025, which were declared a couple of days ago. Among them, again, only two from the region have figured within the top 200. This means only two stand the chance of getting into the Indian Administrative Service (IAS) and Indian Police Service (IPS). The performance of candidates from the region, in fact, has been very poor and dissatisfactory, especially when compared to 2023, when as many as 18 from the region had made it. The result of 2024 was also far from being satisfactory. Though the number of candidates from the region taking the preliminary examination has been gradually increasing, the number of those cracking the prelims, and then the mains, and finally coming out successful in the final, continues to be dismal. The fewer the number of IAS and IPS officers from the region, the fewer the number of local persons in the administrative and police hierarchy of the states. It is not exactly true that officers from outside the region do not work sincerely for the region. There have been, and still are, several officers hailing from outside the region whose performance vis-à-vis that of most locals has been far better. But it is also true that officers belonging to the region will definitely be able to contribute more. A person needs to be motivated from an early age in order to make him or her fit to crack the UPSC. This motivation has to come from both parents as well as teachers. Taking a closer look, one will find that while most parents are not fully aware of the UPSC, the large majority of teachers at the high school level are also equally ill-equipped to train the young minds to set UPSC as their target. The same is the case with recruitments carried out by the Staff Selection Commission, the railways and banks. An environment has to be created to motivate a large number of students from the region, right from the middle school level, to aim at jobs whose vacancies are filled up through bodies like UPSC, SSC, and RRB. High school teachers should also be put through a rigorous training capsule on career counselling so that more students from the region take the all-India tests, with the ultimate goal of increasing the number of local officers in the all-India services, including railways, banking, and defence.