BHUBANESWAR: After free residential UPSC coaching, the Higher Education department is contemplating to offer a ‘Non Residential Civil Services Coaching’ programme to the IAS aspirants in the state.
It has proposed to offer free UPSC coaching to Odia students in non-residential mode by collaborating with an experienced and popular IAS coaching centre which will be selected by the government. Coaching will be provided for both prelims and mains.
Currently, the department offers free residential UPSC coaching through its ‘Residential Coaching’ scheme to over 200 aspirants, which includes 11 months of intensive training for prelims and mains, along with free food and accommodation.
Officials said to widen access and increase the success rate of Odia students in UPSC Civil Services Examination, the department has proposed to launch the non-residential coaching programme in Bhubaneswar, complementing the existing residential model and expanding access to UPSC preparation for a larger number of deserving Odia candidates.
For this, initially 300 students will be selected through a qualifying entrance examination. “Interested students who cleared the UPSC preliminary exam in the previous year can be admitted directly for the coaching. But benefits under the scheme can be availed by a student only once, irrespective of the number of chances he or she can avail for appearing in any competitive examination,” said an official of the department. The coaching will be sponsored by the department which plans to spend an estimated `1.5 lakh per student. It has invited tenders from reputed IAS coaching centres to manage the programme.
“While many aspirants from Odisha move to cities like Bhubaneswar, Delhi and Hyderabad to join private coaching centres, high costs make this option inaccessible to many, especially for those from economically weaker backgrounds. This programme is targeted at such aspirants,” the official added.