Hyderabad: Cracking the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) exam clearly comes with no guarantee of a smooth passage through IAS training. An RTI reply obtained by TOI has revealed that at least 24 IAS probationers – even after clearing one of India’s toughest competitive tests — failed in one or more examinations over the last five years, while at the Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration (LBSNAA) in Mussoorie. Of these 14 were recorded in 2025 and 2026 alone.The probationers undergo a mandatory two-year training at the academy before formally joining the bureaucracy. While close to five lakh aspirants appear for the UPSC every year, about 182 to 184 finally make the cut and join LBSNAA.According to recently inducted IAS officers, the local language proficiency test of their allotted state is one of the exams that probationers usually find themselves with ‘backlogs’ in .“Since I opted for Telangana cadre, I had to take the Telugu test. I scored three out of 20 in my first attempt. I cleared it in the re-test,” said a 2023-batch IAS officer from Bihar, adding how that’s usually true of most probationers.“Soon after the UPSC exam and the hectic preparation that goes into it, many lose interest in academics for a brief while. That’s why they falter,” said a 2022 batch IAS officer, reiterating how almost all of them clear the re-examinations, held within a week. “But it is also true that academy’s curriculum and assessment standards have become significantly more rigorous over the past four to five years,” he added.Among the many subjects that probationers need to take an exam at LBSNAA in are law, basic economic principles and the Indian economy, political concepts and the Constitution of India, management and behavioural sciences, and public administration.The minimum qualifying mark for each subject is 50%.According to LBSNAA officials, there is no prescribed limit on the number of attempts available to probationers for clearing the prescribed subjects or examinations. They are just expected to clear all papers within four years of joining the service.“Marks obtained during the academy training are considered for purpose of seniority of the batch,” said Gautam Thapliyal, deputy director of LBSNAA. “But despite individual failures in respective subjects, the overall pass percentage of IAS probationers between 2018 and 2026 has been 100%, and no probationer has been removed from service or discharged from training for failing to clear the academy examinations,” he added.BOX:The RTI data also revealed that 14 IAS probationers faced disciplinary action during the period. While six probationers from the 2022 batch were proceeded against for various violations, the number rose to eight in the 2025 batch, coinciding with the academy’s stricter enforcement of disciplinary norms. The action was primarily for poor attendance, missing physical training (PT) sessions, using electronic devices inside classrooms and other violations of academy rules. While the academy did not elaborate on the individual cases, IAS officers said disciplinary proceedings are intended to reinforce the standards of conduct expected of future civil servants.
