In a first, 74 women empower IAS
The Centre on Sunday hailed the largest women representation in the history of Indian Administrative Services (IAS) with 74 women officers, making up 41 percent of the current batch of 180 officers.
A day before the Civil Services Day to be addressed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union Minister Jitendra Singh held a customary interaction with the Officer Trainees (OTs) of the 2023 IAS batch.
The officers are undergoing Assistant Secretary programme training, wherein the IAS Officer Trainees are attached to 46 Central Ministries for a period of eight weeks from April 1 to May 30, giving them early exposure to policy formulation and the workings of the Central Government.
Singh also said this batch of IAS officers is not only the youngest and most diverse-but also the most representative of
New India’s aspirations.
The Minister took pride in the academic and professional diversity of the batch, mentioning that 99 officers hail from engineering backgrounds, along with many from medicine and other technical fields. He praised the young average age (22-26 years) of the batch, which provides a long-span career trajectory to contribute to the nation. As regards Prime Minister Modi’s programme, he will also release e-books on holistic development and on innovations comprising of the successes stories on the implementation of the identified priority programmes and innovations. PM will address the nation’s Civil Servants on the 17th Civil Services Day on April 21 and will also confer the Prime Minister’s Awards for Excellence in Public Administration for effective implementation of identified Priority Programmes and Innovation to Districts and Central, State Governments.
A film on the award-winning initiatives will also be screened before the presentation of Awards. This will mark the seventh occasion when Prime Minister Modi will be addressing the National Civil Services Day ceremonies. Civil Services Day is an occasion for the Civil Servants across India to rededicate themselves to the cause of citizens and renew their commitment to public service and excellence in their work.
This date was chosen to commemorate the day when Sardar Vallabhai Patel addressed the probationers of Administrative Service Officers in 1947 at Metcalfe House Delhi. To mark the Civil Services day, Government is organizing a day-long Civil Services Day conference at Vigyan Bhawan, New Delhi.
The Scheme for Prime Minister’s Awards for Excellence in Public Administration has been instituted to recognize the extraordinary and innovative work done by Districts and Organizations of the Central and State Governments for the welfare of common citizen.
The Awards ceremony will be followed by a plenary session on “Civil Services Reforms- Challenges and Opportunities”, chaired by Dr.T.V. Somanathan, Cabinet Secretary.
Four Breakaway Sessions on Strengthening Urban Transportation, Promoting Swasth Bharat through Ayushman Bharat PM - Jan Arogya Yojana and Ayushman Arogya Mandir, Promoting Nutrition for Women and Children through Mission Saksham Anganwadi and Poshan 2.0, Aspirational Blocks Programme will be conducted to mark the occasion.
Meanwhile, Jitendra Singh reflected on the inception of the Assistant Secretary Programme in 2015, calling it Prime Minister Modi’s brainchild to give young officers real-time governance exposure at the beginning of their careers.
