Srinagar, May 11: A day after Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha approved relaxation in upper age limit from 32 to 35 years for the open merit candidates for Combined Competitive Examination, aspirants urged the authorities to relax the same as was in vogue previously.

“By relaxing the age limit, the Lieutenant Governor has shown that government is alive to difficulties faced by us. But relaxation upto 35 years is neither here or there,” a group of aspirants told GNS, adding, “The government should keep it to 37 years as far as open merit candidates are concerned as was the case before SRO 103 was issued.” They expressed optimism the government headed by Lieutenant Governor will not run “roughshod over our genuine demand.”

“While the decision to relax the age bar is welcome, we request the government to provide us one last opportunity. Most of us have already surpassed the age bar of 35 years and given the situation of the past we could not give our best shot,” they said and urged the authorities, in particular Lieutenant governor to intervene as “see that the age criteria is set as per the previous SRO. ”

Under SRO 103, the government has reduced the upper age limit for the J&K Combined Competitive Examination (JKCCE) by five years from 37 to 32 years. However for the previous examination the government had eased the upper age bar to 37-years as “one-time exemption.” On Tuesday last. Lieutenant Governor approved the age relaxation for open merit candidates to 35 years.

The upper age limit for Reserved Category & In-Service candidates has been relaxed to 37 years instead of 34 years and 38 years for Physically Challenged candidates.

“The government is aware about the disruptions caused by the pandemic and given the fact that ours is a welfare state, it should relax the upper age limit to 37 years to allow us one last opportunity in a better environment as compared to previous pandemic-affected environment,” they said, adding, “the door of opportunity should not be closed early.”

The aspirants said that they are confident that the government will not “let them down” and would allow them an opportunity to compete “one last time” for “more posts than the previous one”.

On April 20, J&K Public Service Commission invited applications from J&K domiciles to appear in the J&K Combined Competitive (Preliminary) Examination, 2022 for 220 posts of junior scale J&K Administrative Service, J&K Police Service and J&K Accounts Service.

As per PSC notification, the applications through online mode have been invited “from applicants, who are domiciled in the Union Territory of Jammu & Kashmir, for appearing in examination in accordance with the rules laid down vide SRO-103 of 2018 dated February 23, 2018 and SO 61 of 2021, dated February 23, 2021, issued by General Administration Department Government of Jammu & Kashmir and up to date J&K Public Service Commission (Conduct of Examination) Rules.

Last date for filing of online application complete in all respects along with the requisite fee (online mode only) is May 15, 2022.

The tentative date of Preliminary Examination (in two sessions) is June 26 while the tentative date for commencement of the Main Examination is October 28.