UPSC

About UPSC Exam

The Civil Services Examination (CSE) is a nationwide competitive examination in India conducted by the Union Public Service Commission for recruitment to various Civil Services of the Government of India, including the Indian Administrative Service (IAS), Indian Foreign Service (IFS), and Indian Police Service (IPS). Also simply referred to as the UPSC examination, it is conducted in three phases - a preliminary examination consisting of two objective-type papers (General Studies Paper I and General Studies Paper II also popularly known as Civil Service Aptitude Test or CSAT), and a main examination consisting of nine papers of conventional (essay) type, in which two papers are qualifying and only marks of seven are counted followed by a personality test (interview).

Course Description & Details

The Civil Services Examination is based on the British era Imperial Civil Service tests, as well as the civil service tests conducted by old Indian empires such as the Mauryan Empire and Mughal Empire. It is considered to be the most difficult competitive examination in India. A single attempt takes two complete years of preparation - one year before the prelims and one year from prelims to interview. In total, one sits in actual exam for 32 hours from prelims till interview. On average, 900,000 to 1,000,000 candidates apply every year and the number of candidates sitting in the preliminary examination is approximately 550,000. Results for the Prelims are published in mid-August, while the final result is published in May of the next year.

Educational Qualification

All candidates must have as a minimum one of the following educational qualifications:

• A degree from a Central, State or a Deemed university.
• A degree received through correspondence or distance education.
• A degree from an open university.
• A qualification recognized by the Government of India as being equivalent to one of the above.
• Candidates who have appeared in an examination the passing of which would render them educationally qualified enough to satisfy one of the above points.
• Candidates who have passed the final exam of the MBBS degree but have not yet completed an internship.
• Candidates who have passed the final exam of ICAI, ICSI and ICWAI.
• A degree from a private university.
• A degree from any foreign university recognized by the Association of Indian Universities.