How is the home cadre assigned to an IAS officer?

Once an individual successfully passes the UPSC civil services exam, they are assigned to a specific cadre for service. The procedure for this cadre allocation for All India civil services officers is detailed below.

• India's states are divided into 24 distinct cadres. Each state represents a single cadre, with the exception of three joint cadres: Assam-Meghalaya, Manipur-Tripura, and AGMUT (Arunachal Pradesh, Goa, Mizoram, and Union Territories).
• Vacancies within each cadre are then categorized as general, OBC, or SC/ST.
• These vacancies are further divided among insiders and outsiders using a 30-point roster system. This system ensures that the first vacancy is filled by an outsider, the second by an insider, and so on, in a repeating cycle.
• A list of candidates, along with their home states and willingness to serve in their home states, is then prepared. Each candidate is assigned a serial number, which corresponds to their rank in the merit list.
• Outsiders are allocated to cadres using the roster system after insiders have been properly placed. Insider allocation is done strictly based on rank.
• All cadres are then grouped into four categories, as follows:

Group 1: Andhra Pradesh, Assam-Meghalaya, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat.

Group 2: Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh.

Group 3: Maharashtra, Manipur-Tripura, Nagaland, Orissa, Punjab, Rajasthan, Sikkim.

Group 4: Tamil Nadu, AGMUT, Uttaranchal, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal.

• There are 24 cadres, so the allocation cycles are 1-24, 25-48, 49-72, etc. Candidates ranked 1 to 24 who wish to serve in their home states are placed in the first cycle, and so on.
• If multiple candidates must occupy the same cycle based on their serial numbers, they will be moved to the subsequent cycle.
• If a general category insider vacancy cannot be filled due to a lack of general category candidates, an insider SC/ST candidate will fill the vacancy, provided an SC/ST outsider candidate is available for exchange. If this is not possible, the process is repeated with an OBC candidate.
• Candidates who are unable to be assigned to their home states are arranged in order of merit and allocated to vacancies in different cadres, starting from the first cadre in the order for that year.

For further articles and strategies related to preparing for the IAS exam, refer to our IAS prep website.

The UPSC will announce the civil services exam details for 2021 in February 2021. Keep yourself updated with the notification and application process by clicking on the links below:

1. UPSC Notification 2021
2. UPSC Online Application 2021