Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) Science & Technology; Minister of State (Independent Charge) Earth Sciences; MoS PMO, Personnel, Public Grievances, Pensions, Atomic Energy and Space, Dr. Jitendra Singh today lauded the efforts of the Staff Selection Commission for deciding to conduct the Multi-Tasking (Non-Technical) Staff examination 2022 in 13 regional languages in addition to Hindi and English for the first time.

Dr Jitendra Singh said, the move is in tune with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s vision of providing level playing field to all the job aspirants and to ensure that no one is denied an opportunity or being at disadvantaged due to language barrier.

The thirteen regional languages are Urdu, Tamil, Malayalam, Telugu, Kannada, Assamese, Bengali, Gujarati, , Konkani, Manipuri(also Meiti), Marathi, Odia and Punjabi.

Dr Jitendra Singh said, the move will fulfil the long pending demand of candidates from different States, and particularly from South India for the Exams being conducted earlier in English and Hindi Languages. This is likely to benefit a very large number of candidates from all over the country, the Minister added.

Dr Jitendra Singh asserted that after this historic move, efforts are on to gradually include all the languages mentioned in Eighth Schedule to the Constitution.

Dr Jitendra Singh pointed that Modiji during the inauguration of the the “Kashi Tamil Sangamam” in Varanasi in November, 2022 pointed out that “despite having one of the world’s oldest living languages, i.e., Tamil, we lack in honouring it fully. “This is the responsibility of 130 crore Indians to preserve the legacy of Tamil and enrich it. We have to remember to remove linguistic differences and establish emotional unity”.

Dr Jitendra Singh said, it is the continuous endeavour of the Staff Selection Commission to provide level playing field to different sections of the population so as to bridge the regional disparities and attain the ideals of the Constitution while at the same time celebrating the linguistic diversity of our country.

The Minister informed that in order to review the scheme and syllabus of examinations conducted by the Staff Selection Commission, including the medium in which the examinations are conducted, the Department of Personnel and Training had constituted an Expert Committee. The Committee, has, inter-alia, recommended that it would be in fitness of things to conduct the examinations for lower-level posts in multiple languages, which, to begin with, can start with a few languages and then gradually increase to include all the languages mentioned in Eighth Schedule to the Constitution. The Government has accepted the recommendations of the Committee.

Staff Selection Commission is one of the largest recruiting agencies of the Government of India, its main mandate being recruitment to all Group B (Non-Gazetted) and Group C (Non-Technical Posts) in various Ministries/ Departments of the Government of India the medium of examinations conducted by the Commission is normally Hindi and English.

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