Saturday 11 June 2011

With Exam, India Hunts for Philosopher-Kings

As public protesters have called for broad measures to reduce corruption in the country—such as enacting new laws—India has been tinkering in low-key ways with what is widely viewed as a font of corruption in the country: its bureaucracy.

Prakash Singh/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh at last year’s Civil Services Day, when top bureaucrats were recognized for excellence.

In recent weeks, India has begun making public the financial information of serving administrative officers. And on Sunday, over 300,000 aspirants who hope to join the service's powerful ranks will sit for the first time for a revamped version of the preliminary exam. The new exam, now known as the Civil Services Aptitude Test, is meant to test not only intelligence and knowledge, but also ethics, decision-making skills and moral fiber.

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The exam has long had a reputation as a grueling annual affair that some applicants spend an entire year preparing for—only 5% of the people who show up on Sunday morning will make it through the exam. The lucky 15,000 or so will go through another exam with nine papers and an inter [...]



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