The preliminary exam of the Civil Services will be held on Sunday with over 87,000 students from the two Telugu-speaking States of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh expected to test their luck.
The higher number of aspirants are from Hyderabad (48,939) followed by Vijayawada (12,176), Vizag (11,566), Tirupathi (6,635), Warangal (5,204) and Anantapur (2,869).
The examination will be conducted in two sessions — 9.30 a.m. to 11.30 a.m. and 2.30 p.m. to 4.30 p.m. Paper- I covers General Studies and Paper- II will have questions on Quantitative Aptitude, Reasoning and English. Paper-II has been made a qualifying paper and candidates need to score a minimum of 33% in that for evaluation of their Paper-I. “There is an incremental increase in the number of applicants as compared to previous years. This can be attributed to the success achieved by candidates from the Telugu-speaking States in the recent past. This year, the national topper was from Telangana,” said Gopala Krishna, director of Brain Tree here.
He feel since the number of vacancies has decreased by about 18% this year, the prelims would be the most formidable hurdle in the exams. He advises aspirants to avoid wild guesses as penal marks would affect the chances of success.