The Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) has recently released its annual report for 2022-23, where, it has published many interesting details. The report reveals that out of the selected candidates, only 8% were selected for the Indian Administrative Services (IAS) in their first attempt — reflecting the difficulty of the examination. The report also upheld that the highest success rate of the candidates appearing for both stages of the Civil Services examination was in their third attempt.
The report further divulged that the candidates aged between 24 and 26 years were most likely to be selected. The success rate of men in this age group is 29.4% and that of female candidates is 33.3%. In the age group above 30 years, the success rate of men is 14.6% and the rate of women is 12.5%.
In 2021, while 668 candidates from the general category appeared for the Civil Services Main Examination, 290 candidates passed. Of the total candidates who took the exam in the general category, 40.29% of the male candidates and 53.43% of the female candidates were successful.
Analysing The Last Five Years Trend: The Number Of Students Appearing For Mains Have Decreased, However Selection Percentage Has Increased
- In 2017: 13,060 Candidates Appeared For The Mains, 2,564 Were Selected For The Interviews, 1,056 Were Finally Selected, Selection Percentage (From Mains) was 8.08%;
- In 2017: 10,246 Candidates Appeared For The Mains, 1,992 Were Selected For The Interviews, 812 Were Finally Selected, Selection Percentage (From Mains) was 7.92%;
- In 2019: 11,474 Candidates Appeared For The Mains, 2,302 Were Selected For The Interviews, 922 Were Finally Selected, Selection Percentage (From Mains) was 8.03%;
- In 2020: 10,343 Candidates Appeared For The Mains, 2,049 Were Selected For The Interviews, 833 Were Finally Selected, Selection Percentage (From Mains) was 8.05%;
- In 2021: 8,930 Candidates Appeared For The Mains, 1,819 Were Selected For The Interviews, 748 Were Finally Selected, Selection Percentage (From Mains) was 8.37%.
Other Details:
In the Civil Services Examination, most of the Candidates from engineering backgrounds were competing with subjects from the Humanities as their optional subject. According to the report, more than 60% of the candidates selected in 2022 were from engineering backgrounds — while 81% of the selected candidates chose subjects from humanities as their optional subject. Political Science was a favourite one followed by Anthropology and Sociology. Among the subjects in which at least 100 candidates were interviewed, the number one subject in terms of success rate was Commerce and Accountancy. While Economics and Medical Science were at second and third position. Of the 1819 candidates interviewed (in 2021), 748 were selected, of which 78.2% (585) were graduates and 21.8% (163) were postgraduates.
In 2020-21, 6.22 lakh students appeared for the Civil Services examination. Then 5.16 lakh students appeared in the examination related to Defense Services. In 2022-23, 7.55 lakh candidates appeared for the Civil Services examination and 9.81 lakh candidates appeared for the Defense Services related examinations.