UPSC Exam 2024: History, Full Form, Functions & Recruitment  

As a reputed organization, UPSC has an interesting history, let me take you back into the year of 1923, when under the chairmanship Lord Lee of Fareham, the Royal Commission on superior civil services was set up in India.      

Based on the recommendation of the report submitted by Commission, a Public service Commission having equal number of Indian and British members was established in 1924.   

The key suggestions made by the Lee Commission included 40% of the future entrants to be British, direct recruitment of 40% Indians and promotion from provincial services for 20% Indians.   

The first Public Service Commission, under the chairmanship of Sir Ross Barker, was finally instituted in the year of 1926.  But being a mere advisory role body, it faced pressure from leaders of Indian Independence movement.   

This resulted in the establishment of Federal Public Service Commission under Government of India Act 1935, which later became what we know as Union Public Service Commission after getting constitutional status on 26 January 1950 post-independence.     

Coming back to the present times, UPSC CSE is one of the popular exams in the country as lakhs of aspirants apply for it each year.     

Being an IAS officer is a dream that is harbored in the minds of millions of young Indians today with a purpose to accomplish in the field of administration.  

However, to prepare for an exam of this magnitude, you must work diligently and with enormous passion to ensure your success in the exam. Therefore, you must be thorough with all the information related to UPSC exam.    

To help you with that, I shall be discussing in detail everything you need to know about UPSC full form, functions, notification, exam pattern, syllabus, job profile, salary, booklist, admit card, question papers, result and so on.  

So, without further ado, let’s begin.  

UPSC Full Form  

The full form of UPSC is Union Public Service Commission. It conducts an exam on a national level known as CSE which means Civil Service Examination.  

The exam is held to recruit for the various civil service and government posts like IAS which is an abbreviation for Indian Administrative Service.  

UPSC Functions

The institution of UPSC is bestowed with many roles and responsibilities. As per Article 320 of the Indian constitution, the Union Public Service Commission shall conduct examinations for appointments to various posts and services at the Union level.

Some of the other functions of the UPSC include consultation on the following matters: 

• On methods of recruiting candidates for various civil services posts 
• To make appointments for civil services and other posts.  
• Promotion and Transfer of officers from service to another 
• Checking the suitability of candidates for such appointments, promotion or transfers 
• On taking disciplinary actions against a civil servant serving in a civil capacity including petitions or memorials in such matters.  

In addition to these functions, if requested, the UPSC can also assist two or states in framing and execution of schemes for joint recruitment for any services.  

UPSC IAS Exam 2024 Overview

The UPSC exam is conducted every year to recruit candidates to various civil services of the Indian central government.  

The UPSC CSE is also popularly known as the IAS exam and is conducted subsequently after the official release of the UPSC vacancy memo.   

The UPSC CSE, has three rounds that you need to clear in order to get selected as an IAS officer.  

The first round that you’d need to clear is the Prelims, the second round is Mains, and, the final round is the personal interview 

At every level of your posting, you will be provided with an opportunity of making a deep socio-economic impact in the designated domain of work.

IAS Officer Salary & Job Profile 2024

The salary of an IAS officer includes basic monthly pay and various perks and allowances that he/she is entitled to receive from the government of India.  

• The basic IAS monthly salary according to the 7th Pay Commission is Rs. 56,100.   
• The gross monthly salary of an officer can go up to Rs. 1,50,000 depending on the allowances.   
• The monthly basic salary of a deputy secretary will be Rs. 67,700 after working for 4 years as undersecretary.  

The basic monthly salary of an IAS officer who has spent 37+ in service and is now the Cabinet secretary of India is approximately Rs. 2,50, 000.   

Talking about job profile of an IAS officer, it includes performing duties such as: 

• Monitoring the execution of the government schemes and policies.  
• Handling unnatural situations like calamities, disasters, riots or major accidents that occur in their jurisdiction. 

To know more about an IAS’s job profile and allowances, read in detail about functions and salary of an IAS officer.   

UPSC CSE Notification 2024

Latest Update: – The Prelims result for UPSC CSE 2024 exam has been announced on 01st July 2024.  

The UPSC Prelims 2024 admit card has been released on 07th June 2024 for the exam which will be conducted on 16th June 2024.   

The notification for UPSC exam 2024 has been released on 14th February 2024. The application process began on the same day as the release of the notification and will continue till 5th March 2024.    

A total number of 1056 vacancies have been released in the notification.  

The official UPSC calendar 2024 which was announced on 10th May 2023.     

As per the notification, the UPSC Prelims was scheduled to be held on 26th May 2024. However, the exam date had been postponed and the Prelims exam shall take place on 16th June 2024.  

The Mains exam will commence from 20th September 2024 which is scheduled for a time period of 5 days.     

That’s the brief information regarding the UPSC 2024 Exam dates, however, if you want to know in detail about 2024 UPSC CSE Notification and Exam Dates check the linked blog.   

Let’s now go on to the topic of UPSC Recruitment and then UPSC Vacancy.   

To give you a brief about all the key dates of UPSC CSE 2024, I have placed a table below.   

UPSC Recruitment 2024

Each year, several UPSC recruitments that take place for several different streams. Talking about recruitment to the posts of various civil services, these are points you must look at: 

• The UPSC examination consists of three stages, i.e., Prelims, Mains and the Interview.  
• The UPSC CSE serves as a common recruitment process to fill up the annual UPSC vacancy strengths of other officer posts such as that of IPS, IFS, and IRS officers. 
• This annual UPSC recruitment process lasts for duration between 9 months to a year. 

For UPSC CSE, many students apply for the exam each year, however; only a handful are able to get through to being able to fill in the various UPSC vacant positions. 

I have talked about this in more detail in the next section, of UPSC vacancy. 

UPSC IAS Exam Vacancy 2024

The details for the UPSC IAS Exam Vacancy 2024 are announced along with the release of the notification. 

The UPSC announced a total of 1056 of vacancies which include 40 vacancies reserved for Persons for Benchmark Disability Category, out of which the following –   

• 09 vacancies are reserved for candidates with locomotor disability including cerebral palsy, leprosy cured, dwarfism, acid attack victims and muscular dystrophy;  
• 13 vacancies are reserved for candidates with multiple disabilities;   
• 06 vacancies for candidates with low vision and blindness and 
• 12 for candidates with deafness and low on hearing.  

To get complete information regarding vacancies, you can click on the UPSC Vacancy 2024 and know all the details. 

Let us now take a look into the various eligibility criteria that you’d need to satisfy before being able to take enroll in the UPSC recruitment process. 

UPSC IAS Exam Eligibility Criteria 2024

The topic of UPSC Eligibility is pretty significant, given that according to the criteria mentioned under this topic, you’ll either be allowed to appear for the exam or be disqualified.

Therefore, my advice is that you go through all the Eligibility Criteria properly before applying to appear for the UPSC exam 2024.

1. Nationality

To appear for the Indian Administrative Service, the Indian Foreign Service, and the Indian Police Service, a candidate must be a citizen of India.

For other services the nationality criteria vary, you may find more about it on my blog on eligibility criteria (link provided at the end of the section).

2. Age Limit

• If you are an aspirant from the general category, your age must not be less than 21 years, or you must not have attained the age of 32 years on the 1st of August 2024 of the year of examination.
• Age relaxation up to a maximum of 5 years if you belong to the SC or ST category. So, the upper age limit for SC or ST is 37 years.
• For the OBC category, age relaxation can be granted up to a maximum of 3 years. So, the upper age limit for OBC is 35 years.
• Age relaxation up to a maximum of 10 years if you belong to PwBD (Persons with Benchmark Disabilities) category. So, the upper age limit of 42 years.

Here are the UPSC Age Limits for the various categories – Gen:32, OBC:35, SC/ST: 37, PwBD:42.

3. Educational Qualification

Let me mention directly without beating too much around the bush that you must be a bachelor’s degree holder or hold an equivalent qualification if you want to appear for the UPSC CSE (IAS exam).

So, it’s imperative that you have proof of being a graduate from a state or centrally recognized university.

That means you should have a bachelor’s degree certificate from any educational institute established by an Act of the Parliament of India, or from any university incorporated by an Act of the State and Central Legislature of India, or from any deemed university recognized under the Section 3 of UGC Act of 1956.

4. Number of Attempts

To know more about various aspects of UPSC Eligibility Criteria like age limit and physical standards in detail, read my blog on the same. 

UPSC IAS Exam Pattern 2024

As I have already mentioned before, the UPSC exam 2024 has three rounds that you need to clear in order to be selected as an IAS officer.

The first round that you’d have to clear is the IAS prelims, then come the IAS Mains which is the second round, and finally, the third round consists of personal interviews.

UPSC Exam Pattern for IAS Prelims

The Prelims round of the IAS exam basically consists of 2 papers which include GS Paper 1 and CSAT. The exam pattern for UPSC prelims can be explained as follows:  

• Both the papers include objective- based questions with a weightage of 200 marks each. 
• The exam is conducted in offline mode and the two papers are held on the same day.  
• While the GS Paper 1 consists of 100 questions, the CSAT comprises 80 questions in total. The time duration allotted to complete both papers is 2 hours each.  

• There is a provision of negative marking in both papers, i.e., – 0.66 marks are assigned in Paper 1, whereas – 0.83 marks are allotted in Paper 2 for attempting incorrect answers.  

The Prelims exam is basically a qualifying round, designed to screen out the unsuitable candidates from the recruitment process. Those who clear the Prelims round qualify for the Mains exam.

To understand the exam pattern in detail, you can refer to UPSC Prelims exam pattern which I have explained.  

UPSC Exam Pattern for IAS Mains

The Mains paper consists of 9 subjective (descriptive) type papers which includes 1 essay, 2 Language papers, 2 optional papers and 4 GS Papers. The UPSC CSE Mains are conducted over a period of 5 -7 days. The exam pattern for UPSC Mains can be explained as follows: 

• The 2 Language Papers which consist of Paper A and Paper B are qualifying in nature, comprise 300 marks each.  
• The 4 GS Papers, 2 Optional Papers and 1 Essay paper carry weightage of 250 marks each.  

• The total marks of all papers in the Mains exam are 1750 marks.  
• The time duration allotted to complete each paper is 3 hours.  

If you want to know the exam pattern paper – wise, you can click on detailed UPSC Mains exam pattern.  

UPSC Exam Pattern for IAS Interview Round

This round consists of a personal interview conducted by a panel of unbiased and competent individuals who are absolute experts at testing the personality of the interviewees. 

In this round, your mental and social traits are judged and referenced against those expected of an ideal IAS officer. 

Some of the qualities that the UPSC interview panel looks for in a candidate are as follows: 

• Clear thinking 
• Ethical integrity 
• Balanced mindset 
• Depth of knowledge 

The Interview round holds a maximum mark of 275, meaning that the final merit list has the maximum mark of 2025 (275 of the interviews + 1750 of the Mains). 

To understand the type of questions in this round, you can look at the UPSC Exam Pattern for Interview  

Now it’s time to go through the process of apply online. 

UPSC Apply Online 2024

Latest Update: The UPSC Mains DAF -I procedure has been made available on the official website from 03rd July 2024 to 12th July 2024 (06:00 PM).  

The UPSC online application 2024 process began on the same day as the release of the notification. It started on 14th February 2024 and remained active till 5th March 2024.   

The correction window to make changes in the UPSC application form became available on 6th March 2024 and remained active till 12th March 2024.  

You may refer to the table that I have given below to get a better idea about the 2024 UPSC IAS Application timeline: 

The most important thing when it comes to the online application, I can’t stress this enough, is not to make silly mistakes.

You can check UPSC application fees & steps to apply online  to ensure the successful submission of your UPSC CSE registration form.  

UPSC IAS Syllabus 2024

The UPSC CSE (IAS) syllabus consists of many subjects, it is important that you are familiar with all topics and sub – topics given under the syllabus.  
 
Therefore, if you aspire to crack the IAS exam 2024, then the first step you must take is to be thorough with UPSC syllabus. 

So, as you all know, there are 3 phases in the exam. The first or the Prelims. The second namely the Mains, and the third is the interview round. I have written about these phases in greater detail in the exam pattern section mentioned above.

UPSC Prelims: – It comprises 2 papers which include GS Paper 1 and CSAT. The GS Paper includes wide – ranging subjects like Polity, History, Geography, Economy, Science & Tech etc. 

While the CSAT paper includes questions from topics such as English Comprehension, Reasoning and Quantitative Aptitude.  You can take a look at the key topics for UPSC Prelims provided below: 

The UPSC Mains: – It comprise of 9 papers which include Language Paper A, Language Paper B, Essay Paper, GS 1, GS 2, GS 3, GS 4, Optional Subject Paper 1 & Optional Subject Paper 2 

• The GS Papers include subjects like Indian Polity, Governance, Indian & World History, Geography of India, etc. 
• The Language papers assess you on grammar, reading skills, writing skills, translation, and basic language usage.  
• For the Essay Paper, there is no specified syllabus.  
• As for optional subjects, the candidates must choose any one subject from the list of 26 subjects provided by UPSC. 

The major highlights of the Mains syllabus, including key topics, are: 

The 2 language papers judge you on grammar, reading skills, writing skills, translation, and basic language usage.

For the Essay, there is no prescribed topic. The aim of this paper is to test your ability to articulate your thoughts in a clear, ordered, and concise manner.

I have given the syllabus here in a very brief manner because this is an overview page for the entire UPSC exam 2024. To go through all the important topics and the detailed syllabus for UPSC CSE Prelims & Mains, check the linked blog. 

UPSC Commerce and Management Syllabus 2024

Commerce and Mangement are two of the most popular UPSC Mains optional subjects. These subjects have an organized syllabus, which promises to induce knowledge of highest degree.

If you are an aspirant who will proceed with one of these optional subjects or you are someone who is still searching for the optional to zero in, then in both cases you should give a careful read to the syllabus of both.

The syllabus is available at your disposal, just head over to the page of UPSC Commerce & Management Syllabus 2024.

UPSC IAS Preparation Tips 2024

Preparing for UPSC CSE (IAS) requires dedication, hard work, and willpower and the same applies for UPSC exam 2024. 

As UPSC CSE is a three – stage exam process, the aspirants need to have a strategic study plan in place, especially to cover Mains syllabus which also includes optional subjects apart from GS Papers.

So, if you have Commerce or Management as your UPSC optional subjects for Mains exam, I have shared some preparation tips which will be beneficial in covering both GS subjects and optional subjects.  

I am sure that these tips will prove to be helpful in sketching a good IAS preparation strategy, these are as follows:

• Start with the basics
• Find the right booklist
• Follow the process for 5-6 months
• Start answer writing
• Mocks will make you solid as a rock
• Constant revision and regular feedback

To know how to prepare well for optional subjects, you can check the day – wise UPSC Commerce & Management study plan which I have curated.

UPSC Prelims Books

Without wasting much of your time let me tell you that if you read from the right books, cracking the UPSC exam 2024 won’t be that much of a tough deal.  

The UPSC Prelims, being an entirely objective type of paper, would need a separate booklist for both the papers – GS Paper 1 and CSAT.  

Some of the books recommended for GS Paper 1 and CSAT are as follows: 

GS Paper 1: 

• Indian Art & Culture by Nitin Singhania 
• A brief history of Modern India – Spectrum 
• Indian Polity by M. Laxmikanth 
• Environment by Shankar IAS 

CSAT Paper: 

• General Studies Paper-II for UPSC Preliminary Examination by Tata McGraw Hill 
• Cracking the Civil Services Aptitude Test Paper-II by Arihant 
• A Modern Approach to Verbal and Non-Verbal Reasoning by R.S. Aggrawal 
• English Grammar & Composition by Wren and Martin 

The best way to start your UPSC preparation is by reading through the NCERT books and then moving on to the standard UPSC book list for 2024.  

To access complete booklist for Prelims, you can take a look at the UPSC Prelims books which also includes NCERTs.  

UPSC Mains Books

While talking about UPSC Mains, it is subjective in nature with a total of 9 papers would need its own comprehensive booklist.   

Talking about optional subjects like Commerce & Accountancy and Management, the books for these subjects need to cover the theoretical part of the syllabus and the numericals as well.     

Therefore, selecting the right booklist is an absolute imperative if you want to prepare efficiently for the IAS exam 2024. 
Here are some of the following books recommended for UPSC Mains: 

• India’s struggle for independence by Bipin Chandra 
• GC Leong’s Certificate Physical and Human Geography 
• Challenge and Strategy: Rethinking India’s Foreign Policy by Rajiv Sikri 
• DD Basu’s Introduction to the Constitution of India 
• Ethics, Integrity and Aptitude for Civil Services Main Examination by Subba Rao and P.N. Roy Chaudary 
• Indian Financial System by Bharati V. Pathak  
• Organization Theory & Behaviour by T. N. Chhabra 

You can refer to the recommended complete list for UPSC Mains books including books for Commerce & Management optional subjects. 

UPSC CSE Mock Test Series

From getting a picture of what the real exam would be like to getting an opportunity to solidify strengths as well as identify weaknesses, UPSC CSE Mock Test series is a tool that would play a crucial role in your journey towards glory. 

You must regularly test the waters by practicing on high-quality mock IAS test papers.

According to me, practicing from high-quality mock materials to see where you stand, would the most basic yet rewarding exercise you can take part in. 

To give you further information regarding this I’ve created a distinguished blog.

You can spend time on the UPSC free Mock Test for Commerce & Management to assimilate everything which concerns about the optional subjects of Commerce and Management.  

UPSC Admit Card 2024

Latest Update: The admit card for UPSC Prelims 2024 has been released on 07th June 2024 for the exam which will take place on 16th June 2024. 

Initially the Prelims exam was scheduled to be held on 26th May 2024. 

The Mains exam will commence from 20th September 2024 and the admit card for the same is likely to be announced 3 – 4 weeks before the exam.   

The UPSC admit card is one of the most important pieces of documentation that you need to have on the date of your exams. With the admit card you won’t be allowed to enter the exam hall.   

That said, the UPSC admit cards for both, the Prelims and Mains are released separately, almost a month before each phase.  

Meaning that the UPSC Prelims admit cards are usually released a month before the date of the Prelims exam, and the UPSC Mains admit cards are released a month before the date of the 1st Mains paper of the UPSC Mains round.   

That said, after the release of UPSC admit cards online, candidates need to download and take a printout of their admit cards. This is because only those with a hard copy of their admit cards are allowed to take the exams. Soft copies do not work.  

To know more about the steps to download UPSC admit card, and other details pertaining to it, check the linked page.  
 

UPSC IAS Previous Year Question Papers

Solving previous years’ test papers should be an indispensable part of your preparation strategy.  

• The best way to study for the UPSC exam 2024 is to first try and solve a random previous year question paper. 
• Then, accordingly, you can begin covering the syllabus of the UPSC CSE in a way where you first take care of your weak areas before moving on to the topics that you are already strong at.  
• After you have gone through the UPSC syllabus once, then try solving another previous year’s question paper to test where your preparation stands by identifying your strong and weak areas, and accordingly work on them again.  
• After you are done doing so, solve the third previous year paper.  
• Repeat this process, till you are absolutely confident that there are no weak areas left in your prep.  

That is the point where you’ll have achieved the same level of mastery at every aspect of the UPSC IAS syllabus.  

That’s all I have to say about the previous year papers here in this blog.   

If you want to check the previous year’s question papers for the optional subjects of Commerce and Management, then you can go through the UPSC previous years papers for Prelims & Mains that I have given as downloadable PDFs 

UPSC Answer Key 2023

UPSC CSE answer key is a document that carries the answers of all the questions that gets featured in the respective Prelims Exam.

Every year UPSC releases the marking scheme of the prelims’ exam at the end of the entire exam cycle. However, the minute prelims gets over students start demanding the answer booklet of the exam.

While UPSC makes the candidates wait a longtime and releases the official answer key at the end of the exam process, test takers can still get their hands on the answer key instantly after the exam.

How? Through the special page that I have made which is dedicated to the answer key of the exam.

If you are one or a potential aspirant UPSC exam, then I suppose you take a look at the previous year papers and the respective prelims’ answer key.

You can click on the link to access the UPSC Prelims Answer Keys 2021 – 2023. 

UPSC Exam Analysis

A lot of candidates make the mistake of thinking that once they are done with the UPSC syllabus, and solving mock tests, they are ready to crack the exam. But let me be the one to break this to you. That’s not enough! As long as you have not thoroughly analyzed the previous year’s exam papers, your job is only half done.

One of the most important aspects of a successful UPSC preparation is to analyze the past year’s exam papers. Doing so will render you with a greater understanding of the most important topics from which questions are usually asked in the exam, and also the difficulty levels of the various sections in it.

That said, I have provided my students with a detailed exam analysis of the Commerce and Management past years’ exams. You’d do good to check it out.

However, you might have the question of why I have not made the exam analysis of past exams of the other subjects, well the answer to that is, they are still in the pipeline. I’ll let you know as soon as I am done with them.

But for now, you can go through UPSC exam analysis of the Commerce & Management from 2020 – 2023 which I have comprehensively provided. Do so by clicking on the linked blog. 

UPSC Cut Off 2023

UPSC Cutoff is one of the most sought-after topics.

Okay, so this is an important aspect of your quest to understand the CSE better.

Note: The UPSC 2023 Cutoff will be declared at the end of the examination process, I.e., after the release of the UPSC CSE 2023 Final Result.

The UPSC Cut offs for the UPSC Prelims & Mains, and the Final combined Cut offs of the Mains and Interview rounds are usually released only after the announcement of the Final Results of the UPSC recruitment of that particular year.

Following the norm, the UPSC Cut Off for 2023 has been released instantly after the announcement of the final UPSC results of the year. That said, for your reference, I have given the table of the Final Cut off of the 2023 UPSC exam, down below.

But, before you check that out, let me go through some important things that you should know about the UPSC IAS cut offs:

• The marks of the prelims cut off are of the Prelims Paper 1 or GS paper only. The marks that you get in your CSAT or paper 2 will not be taken into consideration when counting your merit ranking.
• An important thing to note is that the UPSC cut off marks is basically the marks secured by the last candidate that has cleared the round in question. Also, the cut off marks for both the written rounds, namely the Prelims and the Mains, are released only after the declaration of the final results of the exam.

Let us now look at the final cut off marks of some of the 2023 UPSC exam cycle:

UPSC 2023 Final Cut Off

By going over the table above, I guess you now have an idea about what the UPSC IAS cut offs are like.

You can go through the  UPSC Prelims,Mains & Final cutoff  which have been released.  

UPSC Result 2024

Latest Update: The UPSC CSE Prelims 2024 exam result has been released on 01st July 2024 on the official website. 

The official final result for UPSC CSE 2023 has been declared on 16th April 2023 on the website of UPSC.

The result of the UPSC CSE 2023 Mains examination, which was successfully conducted from 15th-24th December 2023, came out on 12th December 2023. You can check the UPSC 2023 Mains Result here.  

The result of the UPSC CSE 2023 Prelims examination, which took place on 28th May 2023, came out on 12th June 2023. Click on the link to check UPSC CSE 2023 Prelims Result 

As far as checking the IAS exam results go, you can only check the results online. The UPSC CSE results are never mailed or sent by courier to you.  

If you want to know about the detailed steps to download your UPSC result, you can go over to the blog I have written UPSC exam results.   

That brings us to the end of this section.   

Conclusion

That brings us to the end of this fairly long but hopefully informative blog. I have briefly covered every aspect of the UPSC exam 2024 in this blog.

If you want to know about each of the individual aspects in detail, you can read about the same in the various UPSC IAS-related blogs that are available on the website. Having said that I guess it’s now time for me to take my leave.

Good Luck and Good day!