Most of IRS trainees are from 'Bimaru' states

Three of the four backward 'Bimaru' states in the country have the maximum representation in the 60th batch of Indian Revenue Service (IRS) officers who will be undergoing training at the National Academy of Direct Taxes (NADT) here. Their total representation comes to 54.7 per cent in the batch.

Contrast this with representation from progressive states such as Maharashtra (3.7 per cent) and Gujarat (zero per cent) or even Delhi (5.6 per cent) and Punjab (3.7 per cent) to appreciate the huge number of candidates that these states are sending.

The term 'Bimaru', incidentally, was coined by noted demographer Ashish Bose in the eighties and includes four states of Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh, which are perceived as backward in the country.

Uttar Pradesh has 14 candidates who will be undergoing training in a batch of 53 for the next 16 months.

Nine candidates are from Bihar. Individual representation of the two states comes to 26.4 per cent and 16.9 per cent respectively. Rajasthan has the third highest representation at 11.3 per cent with six candidates as officer trainees in the batch.

Maharashtra is represented by two candidates as are the states of West Bengal, Punjab, Andhra Pradesh and Jharkhand. Delhi, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu have three candidates each while Orissa, Uttaranchal, Madhya Pradesh and Kerala have one each. One candidate is from Bhutan.

Twenty one candidates have prior work experience and that too from diverse fields like accounts, railways, government universities, public sector enterprises, banks, medicine etc. Just like their fields, their geographical representation is also diverse and they come from 15 different states.

There is an officer trainee who is an MBBS doctor and has later done his post graduation from Indian Institute of Management (Lucknow).

Forty one of the total fifty three are unmarried and are in the age bracket of 23 to 30 years.