Errors galore in TNPSC’s Agriculture Officer exam paper

TNPSC conducted the Agricultural Officer examination a few weeks ago for which 10,000 candidates had applied. Till 2017, TNPSC Agriculture Officer exams only had one paper related to agriculture.

This year onwards, another paper was introduced, containing questions on general studies with aptitude and mental ability, consisting of 75 and 25 questions respectively. The questions were in both Tamil and English. 

In that particular paper, question number five in English (sub-division-4) had the phrase Non Co-operation Movement as an option. In the same question in Tamil, it was printed as “Satta Maruppu Iyakkam’. S Natraja Subramanian, a trainer of TNPSC exams pointed out that the correct answer for Non-Cooperation Movement in Tamil is “Othuziyamai Iyakkam”.

Likewise, in question number 16, the four answer choices - 1926, 1935, 1947 and 1950- were incorrect. “The Central Public Service Commission was set up in 1923 and then it was changed to Madras Service Commission in 1929. It is quite pitiable that even TNPSC officials did not know about it,” Subramanian said. He added that question number 39 carried an incorrect question- that, in fact, the name of the awardee was not correct. In place of Vijayalakshmi Navaneetha Krishnan, Lakshmi Navaneetha Krishnan was printed. In addition, question number 56 dealt with when the first Ryotwari settlement was made. All options- Madras in 1972, Agra in 1970, Bengal in 1971 and Mumbai in 1969 – were incorrect. The correct answer is Madras in 1820.

Each answer carried two marks. Accordingly, due to mistakes in four questions, students might lose eight marks. According to Subramanian, TNPSC officials are unaware of the erroneous paper. “The results are expected in October,” he added. When asked, a senior TNPSC official said that he was not aware of the errors since there was no complaint. “If it comes to our notice, we will take a call,” he said.