Public Services: All India, Central and State Services Under Part XIV

Every officer who clears the civil services examination, and every state government employee who never sits that exam at all, is governed by the same fourteen articles: Part XIV of the Constitution, "Services Under the Union and the States," Articles 308 to 323. This is the part of the Constitution that decides who can dismiss a government servant, how, and on what grounds; how new All India Services get created; and how the Public Service Commissions that conduct recruitment are themselves appointed, protected and made to answer for their advice. This site's practice bank carries exactly two real Prelims questions mapped to this chapter: a 2021 question on the origins of the Department of Personnel and the first Administrative Reforms Commission of 1966, and a 2020 question on which statement best describes the character of Indian bureaucracy. Both sit on top of the structure this note builds.

This chapter's material overlaps with NCERT Class 11, Indian Constitution at Work, Chapter 4 (Executive). This note goes further than that chapter's coverage.

The three-tier classification of India's civil services

India's civil services split into three tiers, and the exam rewards knowing which tier a given service belongs to and why that placement matters.

All India Services (AIS) are recruited by the Union but serve both the Union and the states. An IAS or IPS officer allotted to, say, Bihar works under the state government's day-to-day control for most of a career, while remaining a member of a service the Union recruits into and can transfer between states or to Union deputation. There are three All India Services today: the Indian Administrative Service (IAS), the Indian Police Service (IPS), and the Indian Forest Service (IFoS). This dual loyalty, belonging to neither government exclusively but serving both, is a genuinely unusual federal design: most federations keep national and sub-national civil services entirely separate, so it is this structural oddity, not sentiment about the "steel frame," that makes the All India Services worth studying as a constitutional mechanism.

Central Services are recruited by the Union and serve only the Union, never rotating to state governments the way AIS officers do. They split further into Central Civil Services Group A (the senior, gazetted tier, covering services like the Indian Foreign Service, Indian Revenue Service and Indian Postal Service) and Group B (the subordinate, largely non-gazetted tier), with a Group C below that for non-gazetted staff.

State Services are recruited by a particular state and serve only that state, with no Union role in recruitment or cadre control. A state's own Public Service Commission, not the UPSC, conducts these recruitments, into services such as the State Civil Service (the state-level counterpart of the IAS) and the State Police Service (the counterpart of the IPS).

The exam trap here is treating "All India Service" as a loose synonym for "prestigious central service." It is not: the defining test is whether a service was created under Article 312 to serve both levels of government simultaneously, not how senior or well known it is.

Article 312: how a new All India Service actually gets created

Article 312(1) sets out a specific, and genuinely unusual, legislative procedure. It reads that if the Council of States (the Rajya Sabha's formal constitutional name) "has declared by resolution supported by not less than two-thirds of the members present and voting that it is necessary or expedient in the national interest so to do, Parliament may by law provide for the creation of one or more all India services... common to the Union and the States."

Two things about this wording matter. First, the resolution must originate in the Rajya Sabha specifically, not the Lok Sabha, and it needs a two-thirds majority of members present and voting, not a simple majority. This inverts the usual pattern where the Lok Sabha holds the stronger hand on legislative business: a new All India Service genuinely cannot come into being without the Rajya Sabha's own initiative, since Parliament's law-making power under this article triggers only after that resolution passes. Second, once the resolution is passed, the service itself is created by an ordinary parliamentary law, not a constitutional amendment, so the special difficulty is front-loaded into the resolution stage rather than the law itself.

Article 312(2) then does something easy to misread: it says the IAS and the IPS, the two services that already existed by that name when the Constitution commenced in 1950, "shall be deemed to be services created by Parliament under this article." In other words, the IAS and IPS were never actually taken through the Rajya Sabha resolution procedure; they are deemed, by direct constitutional fiat, to be Article 312 services. The Indian Forest Service is the clean example of Article 312 actually being used as designed: Parliament used this route to constitute the IFoS in 1966, after the Rajya Sabha passed the required resolution, making it the first (and so far only) genuinely new All India Service created through the mechanism the article describes, rather than grandfathered into it.

Article 312 also carries a later 42nd Amendment addition allowing for an all-India judicial service, never actually operationalised, and a separate Article 312A on the conditions of service of certain pre-1950 Crown-era civil servants, a transitional provision with little live testing value today.

Article 310: the doctrine of pleasure

Article 310(1) states the default rule for almost the entire civil service: a member of a defence service, a civil service of the Union, or an All India Service, and anyone holding a civil post connected with defence or under the Union, holds office "during the pleasure of the President." A member of a state's civil service, or anyone holding a civil post under a state, holds office during the pleasure of the Governor. Read on its own, this looks like a total absence of job security: dismissal at will, by the executive, with no cause required.

The article's own opening clause is the key to reading it correctly. Article 310(1) begins "Except as expressly provided by this Constitution," before it states the pleasure doctrine. That phrase is doing real constitutional work: it flags, from the very first line, that this "at pleasure" rule is not absolute and is qualified elsewhere in the Constitution. Article 311 is exactly that qualification. The two articles function as a single system: Article 310 states the general rule that civil servants serve at the President's or Governor's pleasure, and Article 311 carves out the specific procedural safeguards that must be followed before that pleasure can actually be exercised to dismiss, remove or reduce someone in rank. Treating Article 310 as the complete picture, without Article 311's constraints, is the single most common confusion in this chapter, and precisely the 310-versus-311 distinction the exam likes to test with statement-based questions.

Article 311: protection against arbitrary dismissal

Article 311 applies to anyone who is a member of a civil service of the Union, an All India Service, a civil service of a state, or who holds a civil post under the Union or a state. It does not cover members of defence services, which is itself a testable exclusion: Article 310 names defence services alongside civil services and All India Services, but Article 311's protections are narrower and civil-only.

Article 311(1) provides that no such person "shall be dismissed or removed by an authority subordinate to that by which he was appointed." The safeguard is about the rank of the dismissing authority relative to the appointing authority, not about seniority or department. An officer appointed by the President cannot be dismissed by an authority ranked below the President in that appointment chain.

Article 311(2) provides that no such person "shall be dismissed or removed or reduced in rank except after an inquiry in which he has been informed of the charges against him and given a reasonable opportunity of being heard in respect of those charges." This is the core natural justice guarantee: charges must be specified, and the person must get a real chance to answer them, before any of the three penalties (dismissal, removal, or reduction in rank) can be imposed.

The proviso to Article 311(2) then carves out three, and only three, situations where this inquiry requirement does not apply. Getting the exact wording of these three right, rather than a paraphrased approximation, is exactly what UPSC and most coaching material tend to compress loosely, so the precise text is worth quoting directly from the Constitution itself:

• (a) where the person is dismissed, removed or reduced in rank "on the ground of conduct which has led to his conviction on a criminal charge";
• (b) where the authority empowered to dismiss, remove or reduce the person in rank "is satisfied that for some reason, to be recorded by that authority in writing, it is not reasonably practicable to hold such inquiry"; and
• (c) where the President or the Governor, as the case may be, "is satisfied that in the interest of the security of the State it is not expedient to hold such inquiry."

Note precisely what each exception turns on. Exception (a) needs an actual criminal conviction connected to the conduct, not merely a charge or an ongoing trial. Exception (b) needs the dismissing authority itself to record its reasons in writing, a paper trail that keeps this ground from being invoked casually. Exception (c) is reserved to the President or Governor personally, not a subordinate disciplinary authority, and is tied specifically to the security of the state, not general public order or administrative convenience. Article 311(3) adds that if a question arises whether an inquiry was reasonably practicable under clause (2), the dismissing authority's own decision on that question "shall be final," itself a common exam statement to test.

Articles 315 to 319: the Public Service Commissions

Article 315(1) establishes a Public Service Commission for the Union and one for each state. This chapter goes further than the UPSC's brief mention elsewhere on this site into how these Commissions are actually staffed and protected.

Joint Commissions. Article 315(2) to (4) let two or more states agree on a single Joint State Public Service Commission, set up by Parliament once each state legislature passes the requisite resolution, and separately let the UPSC serve a state's needs if that state's Governor requests it and the President approves.

Appointment (Article 316). The Chairman and members of the Union Commission or a Joint Commission are appointed by the President; members of a State Commission by the Governor. As nearly as possible, one-half of a Commission's members must have held office for at least ten years under the Government of India or a state government.

Term (Article 316(2)). A member holds office for six years from the date of entering office, or until reaching a fixed age, whichever comes earlier. For the Union Commission, that age is sixty-five. For a State Commission or a Joint Commission, it is sixty-two. That state and joint commission age was not always sixty-two: the Constitution originally fixed it at sixty, and the 41st Amendment Act, 1976 raised it to sixty-two, a genuinely surprising bit of amendment history buried in the article's own footnotes rather than in its live text. A member is ineligible for reappointment to the same office once their term expires, and may resign in writing to the President (Union or Joint Commission) or Governor (State Commission).

Removal (Article 317). This is the chapter's strongest security-of- tenure clause, mirroring the safeguards used for judicial removal rather than ordinary executive dismissal. Under Article 317(1), the Chairman or any member of a Public Service Commission can only be removed by order of the President, on the ground of misbehaviour, and only after the Supreme Court, on a reference made to it by the President, holds an inquiry under the procedure prescribed under Article 145 and reports that removal is warranted. Even a State Commission member, appointed by the Governor, can only be removed by the President through this Supreme Court process, never by the Governor directly. Article 317(2) lets the President, or the Governor for a State Commission, suspend a member pending that reference. Article 317(3) then adds a faster route that bypasses the Supreme Court entirely: the President may remove the Chairman or a member who is adjudged insolvent, engages in paid employment outside the duties of office during the term, or is, in the President's opinion, unfit to continue by reason of infirmity of mind or body. Article 317(4) deems a member guilty of misbehaviour, for the purposes of clause (1), if they become interested in a government contract or profit from one, otherwise than as an ordinary shareholder of an incorporated company alongside the other members.

Post-office restrictions (Article 319). On ceasing to hold office, the Chairman of the UPSC is ineligible for any further government employment at all. A member other than the Chairman of the UPSC, or the Chairman or a member of a State Commission, has narrower options, broadly limited to the Chairmanship of the UPSC or of a State Commission, but never any other government post. This asymmetric eligibility matrix is a favourite for elimination-style questions that swap which category gets which re-employment option.

Article 320: functions of the Public Service Commissions

Article 320(1) gives the Commissions their headline job: conducting examinations for appointments to the services of the Union and of the states respectively. Article 320(2) adds that the UPSC, if requested by two or more states, will help run joint recruitment schemes for specialised posts.

Article 320(3) then lists the matters on which a Commission must be consulted: methods of recruitment to civil services and posts; the principles for appointments, promotions and transfers, and candidate suitability for these; disciplinary matters affecting anyone serving the Union or a state in a civil capacity, including memorials or petitions on such matters; claims for legal costs incurred defending official acts, payable from the Consolidated Fund; and claims for pension over injuries sustained in civil service.

The important qualification sits in the proviso to clause (3): the President (for All India Services and other Union services and posts) or the Governor (for state services and posts) may make regulations specifying matters on which a Public Service Commission need not be consulted at all. So this consultation duty, despite reading as mandatory, is itself subject to an executive carve-out, and any such regulation must be laid before Parliament or the state legislature for at least fourteen days under Article 320(5). Article 320(4) separately puts two matters permanently outside the consultation requirement, needing no regulation to exclude them: reservations under Article 16(4), and giving effect to Article 335 (SC/ST claims to services and posts). A statement asserting that PSC consultation is unconditional for all recruitment and disciplinary matters is a reliable wrong answer.

Quick revision points

• Three tiers: All India Services (IAS, IPS, IFoS; recruited by the Union, serve both Union and states) versus Central Services (recruited and serving only the Union, split into Group A and Group B) versus State Services (recruited and serving only one state).
• Article 312: a new All India Service needs the Council of States (Rajya Sabha) to pass a resolution by not less than two-thirds of members present and voting, declaring it necessary or expedient in the national interest; only then can Parliament legislate to create it. IAS and IPS are deemed created under this article; the Indian Forest Service (1966) is the actual worked example of the procedure being used.
• Article 310 states the default: defence services, Union civil services and All India Service members serve at the President's pleasure; state civil servants serve at the Governor's pleasure, except as qualified elsewhere in the Constitution, principally by Article 311.
• Article 311(1): no dismissal or removal by an authority subordinate to the appointing authority. Article 311(2): charges must be specified and a reasonable opportunity of being heard given, before dismissal, removal or reduction in rank.
• The three exceptions to Article 311(2)'s inquiry requirement: (a) dismissal following a criminal conviction, (b) the disciplinary authority recording in writing that an inquiry is not reasonably practicable, (c) the President or Governor personally satisfied that an inquiry is inexpedient in the interest of state security.
• Article 316: PSC members hold office for six years or until age 65 (Union Commission) / 62 (State or Joint Commission), whichever is earlier. The state/joint age was originally 60, raised to 62 by the 41st Amendment, 1976.
• Article 317: a PSC Chairman or member can be removed only by the President, on the ground of misbehaviour, after a Supreme Court inquiry under Article 145 procedure, mirroring judicial removal safeguards. A faster route exists under 317(3) for insolvency, outside paid employment, or infirmity of mind or body.
• Article 320: PSCs conduct exams and must be consulted on recruitment methods, promotions, transfers and disciplinary matters, but the President or Governor can exclude specific matters from this consultation duty by regulation, and Article 16(4) reservations and Article 335 claims are excluded outright.

Once the 310-versus-311 relationship and the exact three exceptions in Article 311(2)'s proviso are second nature, work through this site's two Prelims questions on this chapter to pressure-test that recall alongside the wider civil services syllabus.