Chandikhole youth tops OAS exam in first attempt without coaching – Times of India

BHUBANESWAR- Aswini Kumar Panda topped the Odisha Civil Services Examination (OCSE)-2019, results of which were declared by the Odisha Public Service Commission (OPSC) on Friday. A total of 153 candidates including 56 women cleared the final round of examination.

Panda, a 29-year-old engineer hails from Chandikhole in Jajpur district, said he did not take help of any coaching centre to crack the OCSE. ‘I never thought that I will top the examination. I am so happy that I achieved this feat in my first attempt without taking coaching from any institute,’ he added.

He said candidates should not solely rely on any coaching institute. ‘Over rely on a coaching centre may hamper the aptitude of a candidate for civil services. Preparing for this prestigious examination is like self-discovery for a candidate. Self-study and self-evaluation will help the candidates to get more success in these examinations,’ he added.

Before this civil service examination, Panda had applied for an assistant section officer (ASO) job. ‘But I could not get the job due to a shortage of 0.5 mark for the selection mark. Later I started preparation for OCSE from September 2019. Our preliminary was in March 2020,’ he added.

He has completed his schooling from Jana Kalyan High School near his native place and Plus II from the Ravenshaw University. After BTech from a private college in Berhampur, he got a job in Delhi. ‘After working three years there, I left the job and started preparing for ASO and OCSE. I will also try to clear the civil service examination conducted by the UPSC. I am preparing for that,’ he added.

Women candidates have grabbed three positions of the OCSE top 10 list. Rashmirekha Patra, Ayushi Pati and Nivedita Nayak secured rank 3, 9 and 10 respectively. One of the 153 candidates belongs to the persons with disabilities category, said the OPSC sources.

As many as 25,780 out of 47,719 candidates applied for the OCSE-2019 took the preliminary examination held on March 15 last year. Out of these, 1610 wrote the Main examination held in December last year, but 307 were called for interviews conducted between September 22 and October 5. Covid-19 has adversely affected the examination schedule, said the OPSC.

There were vacancies of 30 posts in Odisha Administrative Service (OAS), nine posts in OFS and seven posts in the OPS.