New Delhi: The Central Administrative Tribunal has issued a notice to the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) over a plea, seeking a reduction in the cut-off for the Part II paper of the Civil Services (Preliminary) Examination, 2023.

This year's preliminary exam was held last week. The candidates had complained that Part 2 Civil Services Aptitude Test (CSAT) was tough.

The principal bench of the tribunal will consider the petition. One demand is that the existing 33 percent cut-off should be reduced to 23 per cent. The plea has also sought to give directives for conducting the Part II exam again. The petition also stated that the questions in the C-SAT exam were on the model of the Common Admission Test (CAT), which is conducted for MBA admission, and Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) held for engineering admission.

The C-SAT exam is conducted to assess the general aptitude of the candidates and though the syllabus says questions are based on the Class 10 portions, these are getting tougher every year, the petition pointed out.