Graduates and Post Graduates Entry into Armed Forces
Union Public Service Commission through its notification in leading newspapers and Employment news, in the months of April and October, conducts an entrance examination for entry into the officer cader of Army, Navy and Air Force. Candidates qualifying in written examination have to appear before a service selection board (SSB) for interview.
Those opting for Air Force have to undergo Pilot Aptitude test. Those who come in the merit list undergo medical examination and after selection are sent to following training establishments according to choice given by the candidates and their merit list ranking.
-Indian Military Academy, Dehradun (IMA)
-Naval Academy, Goa
-Air Force Academy, Begumpet, Hyderabad
-Officers Training Academy, Chennai
Those joining in any of the first three establishments get permanent commission. Candidates selected for OTA Madras are given short service commission.
Applicant is required to specify clearly the services for which he wishes to be considered in the order of his preference. He is also advised to indicate as many preferences as he wishes to, subject to fulfilling the conditions of eligibility, so that with regard to his rank in the order of merit due consideration can be given to his preferences when making appointment.
If an applicant is competing for OTA as well as for any other Course(s), viz., IMA, Naval Academy
and Air Force Academy, the OTA will always be his last choice. In such cases, the applicant must, therefore, give OTA as his last choice, otherwise OTA will be deemed to be the last choice even if it is given a higher preference by the applicant. OTA can be the first preference if it is the one and only choice.
Applicants are considered for appointment to those courses only for which they exercise their preference and for no other course.
No request for addition/alteration in the preferences indicated by a candidate in his application is entertained by the Commission. No change of choice once exercised is allowed. Second choice comes for consideration only when the first choice is not offered to the candidate by Services HQ. When first choice is offered and a candidate declines the same, his candidature is cancelled for all other choices for regular commission.
Centres of Examination for CDSE - Agartala, Ahmedabad, Aizawl, Allahabad, Bangalore, Bareilly, Bhopal, Bombay, Calcutta, Chandigarh, Cochin, Cuttack, Delhi, Dharwar, Dispur (Guwahati), Gangtok, Hyderabad, Imphal, Itanagar, Jaipur, Jammu, Jorhat, Kohima, Lucknow, Madras, Madurai, Nagpur, Panaji (Goa), Patna, Port Blair, Rajpur, Sambalpur, Shilong, Shimla, Srinagar, Tirupati, Trivandrum, Udaipur and Vishakapatnam.
The centres and the date of holding the examination can be changed at the discretion of the Commission.
Requirements of age limits, sex and marital status
For IMA -
Unmarried male candidates in between the age of 18 and 23 years for example : born not earlier than 2nd July, 1992 and not later than 1st July, 1997) only are eligible.
For Naval Academy -
Unmarried male candidates in between the age of 18 and 22 years (for example : born not earlier than 2nd July, 1994 and not later than 1st July, 1997) are only eligible.
For Air Force Academy -
Unmarried male candidates in between the age of 18 and 21 years (for example : born not earlier than 2nd July, 1993 and not later than 1st July, 1997) are only eligible.
For Officers’ Training -
Academy male candidates (married or unmarried) in between the age of 18 and 24 years (for example : born not earlier than 2nd July, 1991 and not later than 1st July, 1997) are only eligible.
The date of birth accepted by the commission is that entered in the Matriculation of Secondary School Leaving Certificate or in a certificate recognised by an Indian University as equivalent to Matriculation or in an extract from a Registrar of Matriculates maintained by a University, which extract must be certified by the proper authority of the University or in the Higher Secondary or an equivalent Examination Certificate.
Conditions of eligibility - A candidate must either be -
(i) a citizen of India, or
(ii) a subject of Bhutan, or
(iii) a subject of Nepal, or
(iv) a Tibetan refugee who came over to India before the 1st January, 1962 with the intention of permanently settling in India, or
(v) a person of Indian origin who has migrated from Pakistan, Burma, Sri Lanka & East African countries of Kenya, Uganda, United Republic of Tanzania, Zambia, Malawi, Zaire and Ethiopia and Vietnam with the intention of permanently settling in India :
Provided that a candidate belonging to categories (ii), (iii), (iv) and (v) above shall be a person in whose favour a certificate of eligibility has been issued by the Government of India.
Certificate of eligibility will, however, not be necessary in the case of candidates who are Gorkha subjects of Nepal.
A candidate in whose case a certificate of eligibility is necessary may be admitted to the examination provisionally subject to the necessary certificate being given to him by the Govt. before declaration of result by UPSC.
Educational qualifications -
For IMA and Officers’ Training Academy - Degree of a recognised university or equivalent.
For Naval Academy - B.Sc with Physics & Mathematics or Bachelor of Engineering.
For Air Force Academy - Degree of a recognised university or equivalent with Physics and/or Mathematics as subjects. Candidates who have passed their degree examination with subjects other than Physics and/or Mathematics as subjects are also eligible provided they have passed the Higher Secondary Examination (old pattern) or the 11th/12th Standard Examination under the 10+2 pattern of school education or an equivalent examination with mathematics and Physics as subject of Examination.
Graduates with first choice as Army/Navy/Air Force are to submit proof of graduation provisional certificates within two weeks of completion of SSB interview to Army HQ (Rtg. CDSE Entry)/NHQ (R&R Section)/Air HQ-PO-3(A) respectively.
Candidates who are studying in the final year Degree course and have yet to pass the final year degree examination can also apply but they will be required to submit proof of passing the degree examination.
Scheme of examination -
The competitive examination comprises (a) written examination, (b) Interview, intelligence and personality test
Subject Duration Marks English 2 Hrs 100 General Knowledge 2 Hrs 100 Elementary Mathematics 2 Hrs 100 For admission to officers training academy Subject Duration Marks English 2 Hrs 100 General Knowledge 2 Hrs 100
The maximum marks allotted to the written examination and to the interviews are equal for each course, i.e., maximum marks allotted to the written examination and to the interviews are 300, 300, 300 and 200 each for admission to Military Academy, Air Force, Naval Academy and Officers Training Academy.
For candidates joining the Air Force Academy -
There are three modes of entry into Flying (P) Course viz. CDSE/NCC/Airmen. Candidates who apply for Air Force through more than one source will be tested/interviewed at Air force as well as other arms of services. Common candidate who fail in INS-B/(Pilot Aptitude Battery) PAB test as an NCC or Airmen candidate can be called again for (Officer Like Quality) OLQ testing for Army/Navy/OTA only, if it is found that he has applied through CDS Exam also. All papers in all subjects consist of objective type questions.
Question Papers are set in English only In question papers, wherever necessary, questions involving metric system of Weights and Measures are included. Candidates have to write the papers in their own hand. In no circumstances are they allowed the help of a scribe to write answers for them. The commission have discretion to fix qualifying marks in any or all the subjects of the examination. The candidates are not permitted to use calculator for answering objective type papers.
For the admission to IMA, Naval and Air Force Academy
