P. Kanagaraj

P. Kanagaraj is working as Associate Professor of Political Science in Government Arts College, Coimbatore. He also works as Chief Mentor of the Higher Studies Centre, Coimbatore for the past six years. He did his Post-Graduation, Master of Philosophy and Doctorate from Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.
Career
He provides free Civil Services Coaching to the youth in the state. So far fifty two of his students have got through the exam and now they work as IAS, IPS, IRS officers in various states. Now nearly four hundred students attend his free coaching.
The students work as IAS, IPS, IRS officers in Punjab, Haryana, Bihar, West Bengal, Karnataka, Kerala and Tamil Nadu. There are more than 400 students attending this free coaching program for preliminary test, main test and personality test. They hail from the length and breadth of the country from Coimbatore, Chennai, Hyderabad, Cochin, Bangalore, Pune, Bhopal and New Delhi. He provides coaching in both papers of General Studies and Aptitude in the Preliminary Test. He provides coaching in Political Science and International Relations and General Studies. Daily classes are conducted from 3pm till 7pm. they have weekly tests on Saturday.
His interview coaching program is very unique. Usually he conducts extensive and intensive classes on important issues and areas in politics, economy, modern India, international relations, science and technology and environment. The classes are conducted for a protracted period of five months for interview of the IAS exam alone. He conducts the mock interview too. The stimulation or mock interview is really unique and productive for the candidates. The interview panel will be usually chaired by a senior bureaucrat belonging to either Indian Administrative Service or Indian Police Service. The panel will have three officers of All India Services and central services as members along with me. It will resemble the actual interview of the UPSC in all respects.
The panel will examine the personality traits and psychological aptitude of the candidates by conducting a purposive conversation for about twenty five minutes. At the end of the interview the candidates will be provided with feedback and suggestions. The candidates must come for interview in formal attire. At the end of interview they will be provided with an individual feedback and later on all the candidates will be given a collective feedback by the panelists at the end of the interview session. He had conducted so far a total of 325 mock interviews for the benefit of youngsters from all over India.
He says that his coaching is based on social service orientation. The coaching is underpinned by the vision to provide affordable coaching to the students from the semi urban, rural and underprivileged background. As it is a free service without any commercial considerations umpteen numbers of officers are associated with this endeavor. Last year alone nearly a hundred and twenty five officers belonging to IAS, IPS and IRS came to his free coaching program to conduct this mock interview. As these officers are passionately committed to mentoring the youth they always provide their time, energy, expertise and experience free of cost.
Apart from civil services exam around one thousand students have got through various competitive recruitment exams in diverse sectors like banking, uniformed services, School and Collegiate services, Public Sector companies and TNPSC Exams. Entire coaching is provided free of cost as social service.
The candidates always insist on paying fees to the coaching program but he always tells them that the best payment they can pay is in the future, in their selfless service to the nation.
He says that our recruitment process in civil service exam is very unique in many ways. For example in no other system provides so much of power, change in status to so young a people as in civil services. Moreover this recruitment procedure is very democratic and egalitarian. The selection list of UPSC reflects the Indian society and its diversity rather accurately, a kind of microcosm of India. All major social communities are represented.
He also conducts a series of programs titled “Empowering for Future” that seek to provide skill, knowledge and attitude empowerment to the youth and children of our country. The basic objective of these programs is to transform the potential of youth population (Demographic Dividend) into individual, societal and national resources and development. The students are inculcated with values of patriotism, social commitment, integrity, professionalism and selfless service. ”Empower the youth and Enrich our India” is the motto of this social service endeavor.
The flagship program in this Empowering for Future is the Career Guidance Program for students and youths studying from 9TH standard to university levels. They conduct this program to empower poor and under privileged school children who study in government and corporation schools and who suffer from deficit of guidance from their parents and institutions. So far around thirty thousand children have been provided with skill and knowledge empowerment in the last two years. This program basically attempts to provide soft skills, leadership training, career guidance, personality development, team spirit to the dis-privileged children living in urban slums and remote villages. He says that his team has identified a total of twenty six fields and areas including engineering, medicine, chartered accounting, civil services, TNPSC exams, national educational entrance exams like CAT, biotechnology, media studies etc. in which exposure is provided to students. Every beneficiary is provided with a specially prepared book dealing with career choices free of cost. The civil service exam aspirants of his coaching program who come from diverse educational backgrounds like medicine, engineering, law, management sciences, physiotherapy and mass communication provide their expertise in this program. In fact he believes that the free coaching program will create a confluence of talents and resultant synergy that will have tremendous positive impact on the society

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