There is good news for students with excellent academic background who have been dreaming of making it to the country's elite civil service but can not get proper coaching.

As a major boost to meritorious students of Jammu & Kashmir wanting to join the celebrated Indian Administrative Service (IAS), the government has come up with a special scheme for their coaching in New Delhi's reputed institutes. The scheme is part of the Chief Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad's policy to build capacity among government employees and widen the opportunities for students to successfully compete at the national level.

The J&K Institute of Management, Public Administration and Rural Development (IMPA), designated by the government as the nodal agency to organise the coaching for the IAS Examinations, has invited applications from desirous students to be received at the twin offices of the Institute in Srinagar and Jammu till February 9, 2008.

Giving details of the scheme, the Director General, IMPA, Mr. Madhav Lal said here that the coaching programme would be of six months and held in two phases. The first phase of two month's coaching would be for the Preliminary Examination and the second phase of four months for the Main Examination, he said, adding that both phases would be held prior to the holding of the respective examinations.

Madhav Lal said that the eligibility criteria for the open merit candidates would be minimum 65% marks for commerce, science and engineering graduates, 60% for arts graduates and minimum 60% at graduation and 55% at post-graduate level for post-graduates in commerce, science and engineering subjects. The minimum percentage of marks for post-graduate candidates in arts subjects would be 55% at graduate and 50% at post-graduate level, he said.

The DG IMPA said that in case of candidates belonging to reserved categories of SC/ST and OBC the minimum percentages would be uniformly 5% less than for the open merit candidates. He said only permanent residents of Jammu & Kashmir State who fulfill the age criteria prescribed for the examinations would be eligible to apply. He said the annual family income of the candidate from all sources should not be more than Rs. 2 lakhs.

Madhav Lal said that a committee has been constituted to select the candidates. The selection committee, headed by Director General IMPA, has Secretary, General Administration Department and Secretary, ARI/Trainings Department as members and would co-opt experts from academic field as per requirement. He said at the time of selection, 60 points would be given to graduation, additional 15 to post-graduation and 25 to the interview. He said in the event of applications being three times more than the intake capacity of 20, the candidates would go through an objective type screening test of graduation standard to select 60 candidates on the basis of academic merit. These selected candidates would then be interviewed by the selection committee. He said the 20% selected candidates would be from SC/ST/OBC categories.

Madhav Lal said that the selected candidates would be sent for coaching to reputed institutes, preferably in Delhi. As incentive, coaching fees of the concerned institute would be reimbursed to the selected candidate in full subject to a maximum of Rs. 8,000 per month, besides providing a monthly stipend of Rs. 5,000 for the six months of coaching. A lump sum financial assistance of Rs. 10,000 would be also given to each selected candidate for purchase of books and periodicals. The selected candidates would be entitled to A-Class bus fare up to Jammu, to and fro, and 2nd Class AC to and fro rail fare from Jammu to New Delhi.

In case of the candidates who qualify the Preliminary Exam on their own, Mr. Madhav Lal said that they could also appear before the Selection Committee for coaching for the Main Examination irrespective of the stipulated eligibility criteria. The annual family income criteria, however, he said, would remain. He said a maximum number of five such candidates would be selected for coaching in addition to the fixed intake capacity of 20. They would also be eligible for financial assistance as per the scheme, he added.