BANGALORE, August 28: To attract more candidates for vacant posts in the various public sector banks and in Union government departments, the Kannada Development Authority (KDA) has decided to provide coaching at the district-level for those appearing for competitive examinations.
As many as 20 public sector banks have invited applications for more than 10,000 vacancies, including clerks and officers’ posts. The last date for submitting applications online is September 7.
Addressing presspersons here on Tuesday, KDA Chairman “Mukhyamantri” Chandru said that the staff of the Education and Labour departments of the State and bankers would be roped in to conduct coaching classes for candidates. Coaching would be provided in Kannada and English, he said.
To create awareness about competitive examinations in the banking sector, he said that information related to examinations would be displayed on notice boards of all educational institutions, colleges and the Labour Department’s offices at the district and the taluk level.
Various Union government recruiting agencies, including the Staff Selection Commission and the Institute of Banking Personnel Selection, have been conducting examinations in only two languages — Hindi and English. He would write to Union Finance Minister P. Chidambaram urging him to conduct examinations in Kannada and the other languages mentioned in Eighth Schedule of the Constitution.
Mr. Chandru said that lack of awareness about competitive tests and poor knowledge about submitting online applications were the major reasons for the negligible number of candidates appearing for banking examinations in the State.
Though various agencies of the Centre conduct more than 120 different types of examinations, only a few hundreds have been appearing for the tests, he said.
Karnataka ranks poorly
Karnataka ranked among the last in the country with regard to number of candidates applying for various banking examinations conducted in 2011. Karnataka ranked 28th, Mizoram 29th and Arunachal Pradesh 30th.
According to the Institute of Banking Personnel Selection, which conduct tests, 5,149 candidates applied for writing examinations, which accounted for 0.00842 per cent to the State’s total population of 6.11 crore.
KDA chairman “Mukhyamantri” Chandru, who released the data prepared by the institute, said that in terms of percentage of applications, union territory Chandigarh topped the list followed by New Delhi, Kerala, Uttarakhand, Jharkand and Haryana.
The highest number of candidates who applied for banking tests in 2011 is from Uttar Pradesh (79,257), followed by Andhra Pradesh (56,842) and Bihar (48,249), he said.
