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Thursday March 28, 2024

992 PhDs among 1.9m who took clerk-level Tamil Nadu job test

By Monitoring Report
February 15, 2018

CHENNAI: The next time you visit a government office in the state, don’t be surprised if some of the clerical staff rattle off complex theories in basic sciences or speak about the intricacies of building bridges and power plants.

In an indication of the clamour for government jobs, a scarcely believable 992 PhD holders, 23,000 MPhil holders, 2.5 lakh post-graduates and eight lakh graduates were among the nearly 20 lakh applicants for the exam conducted across the state on February 11 by the Tamil Nadu Public Service Commission (TNPSC), seeking to fill 9,500 posts of typists, Village Administrative Officers (VAO) and stenographers, says a report published The Times of India.

While data sourced from the TNPSC shows that 19.83 lakh applied for the exam, a top official in the commission said more than 15 lakh had appeared for the exam.

While the required qualification was securing a pass in Class X, the number of graduates who applied for the exam outstripped those who had only cleared Class XII or Class X. Non-engineering graduates (6.2 lakh) accounted for the largest chunk of graduates among the applicants.