UPSC starts ‘one time registration’ facility for govt job aspirants

The UPSC has started a one time registration (OTR) facility for government job aspirants who will now not be required to fill in their basic details every time they apply for different recruitment examinations.

The aspirants, who wish to apply for any future examination of the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC), are required to register themselves in the OTR platform by filling up their basic personal information indicated therein.

"A large number of aspirants apply for a host of examinations conducted by the UPSC throughout the year to select officers for different central government departments/organisations. The OTR platform will help them in saving time and make the application process more easy," a senior official said on Wednesday.

Once the registration of an aspirant is completed, the information will remain stored securely in the Commission’s servers, the UPSC has said.

An aspirant’s information will get automatically populated in the online application form of an examination for which she or he applies, it said.

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Need for OTR

The OTR will be quite useful for the candidates as it will not only save them from filling in their basic personal details again for any subsequent examination being conducted by the UPSC, but also eliminate any possibility of submission of incorrect information by them as their basic personal details will be validated by the candidates themselves, the Commission said.

“With a view to facilitate the process of submission of applications by the aspirants of its examinations, the Union Public Service Commission is glad to launch ‘one time registration’ (OTR) platform on the Commission's website at upsc.gov.in and upsconline.nic.in on 24 X 7 basis,” it said in a statement.

Since about 70 per cent information of an aspirant in the OTR will automatically be pre-populated in the online application form of an examination, the time for filling or submitting an online application form will be reduced considerably, the UPSC said.

Aspirants have been advised to peruse the OTR instructions and fill in the information with extreme care to avoid any complications in future, it said.

Frequently asked questions

The Commission has also issued Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) “with respect to attempts in the civil services examination”.

The civil services examination is conducted annually in three stages -- preliminary, main and interview -- to select officers of Indian Administrative Service (IAS), Indian Foreign Service (IFS) and Indian Police Service (IPS), among others.

Candidates belonging to General/Economically Weaker Sections (EWS) category are allowed six attempts, those belonging to Scheduled Caste (SC)/Scheduled Tribe (ST) are given unlimited chances, nine each to the those belonging to Other Backward Classes (OBC) and for the Persons with Benchmark Disability (Unlimited for SC/ST), according to answer to one of the FAQs.

Number of attempts

“An attempt at the preliminary examination is considered an attempt at the civil services examination: If a candidate actually appears in any one paper in the preliminary examination,” it said.

It is the primary responsibility of the candidate to keep a record/track of number of attempts availed by him/her, the UPSC said, responding to a FAQ as to how would an aspirant know the number of attempts already availed by him/her in the civil services examination? The number of attempts availed by a candidate in the civil services examination is checked/verified from the available data/records with the Commission at appropriate stage of this examination, it said.

In all cases of misleading information on number of attempts availed by the candidates, the Commission cancels the candidature of the said erring candidates for that particular civil services examination and also debars them for 10 years in respect of all future examinations/selections of the Commission, the UPSC said.