Bhubaneswar, May 30: The state government has given its nod to the proposal to introduce negative marking for multiple choice questions in the Odisha Civil Services examinations.
For each wrong answer given by an examinee, one fourth of the marks assigned to that question will be deducted as penalty, said chief secretary Gokul Chandra Pati after today's cabinet meeting.
If a candidate marks more than one choice for a question, it will be treated as a wrong answer. But if a question is left bank, the examinee will not be penalised, Pati said.
The Odisha Civil Services (Combined Competitive Recruitment Examination) Rules will be amended to introduce this provision.
The Odisha Public Service Commission (OPSC) had made the proposal to introduce negative marking in civil services exam.
The cabinet today also decided to hold the annual recruitment examination regularly.
The decision was taken as the OPSC, which recruits candidates for the Odisha combined civil services, had expressed displeasure over the irregular conduct of the recruitment examination.
The OCS-2011 was held in the state after a gap of six years.
Orissa High Court had also ticked off the government and the commission for their failure to hold the exam regularly.
The court in their order delivered on January 16 said: "We expect that the State Government and the OPSC would make all endeavours to conduct Odisha Civil Services Combined Competitive Recruitment Examination regularly every year keeping in mind mandatory provision of "1991 Rules" in the background of existence of large number of vacancies."
Skill aid
The meeting decided that the state government would avail external aid of Rs 662 crore from the Asian Development Bank to support the Odisha Skill Development Project from 2015-16 to 2019-20. Under this project, eight advanced skills training institutes will be established which will function as finishing schools-cum-production centres.
Land policy
The cabinet also approved the CDP land and implementation policy for providing enabling framework for implementation of comprehensive development plans (CDPs) by providing land and funds.
To effectively review and monitor the policy two committees will be formed.
The state government will create a CDP Infrastructure Development Fund to finance infrastructure development projects including affordable housing, master plan roads, open space development and transport facilities.
VAT exemption
The cabinet also okayed the proposal to waive 5 per cent value added tax (VAT) on the procurement of groundnut pods and sunflower seeds by the Odisha State Cooperative Marketing Federation (Markefed) from the farmers.
