KAS exam valuation: OMR machines eject 8100 more sheets

Thiruvananthapuram: Valuation machines have ejected another 8100 OMR answer sheets of KAS preliminary examination due to low quality of the papers.

The machines ejected unread OMR sheets of the second paper examination conducted on 22nd February afternoon. With this the total number of ejected unread answer sheets climbed to 17,000.  Earlier, 9500 answer sheets of the first paper examination were also rejected by the machines. These papers were manually valued by PSC employees subsequently. As the number of papers for manual valuation increases, the final examination is likely to be delayed.

Across three streams, around 3.5 lakh candidates wrote the preliminary examination. PSC had assessed that the preliminary list of candidates could be published latest by July 15. Hence, manual valuation of the first paper examination was completed on Friday.

However, as the OMR sheets of the second paper have also been ejected, the officials are apprehensive about not being able to finish the task even by July 30. The change in the colour variant of the sheets supplied by the Hyderabad company has also proved troublesome for PSC.

As of now, PSC assesses that the valuation can be completed by 15th July to publish the result in August and conduct the main exam in September or October.

The exam department has asked for more number of employees to conduct the final examination in August.

The employees in the rank of Assistant Section Officer under the age of 32 years are deployed for the valuation duty after ascertaining that they or their relatives are not candidates of the examination. As the number of PSC officials under this category is low,  only 21 officials could be hired for the valuation of the first paper examination. The same officials will be assigned the valuation of the second paper examination too.