Civil Service Exams | UPSC Tells Supreme Court That It Has Decided To Publish Provisional Answer Keys After Prelims

In a major policy shift, the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) has informed the Supreme Court that it will publish the answer keys of the Civil Services Preliminary Examination after the test is conducted. The Commission revealed this in an affidavit filed in response to a writ petition seeking measures to improve transparency in the Civil Services Examination process.

Currently, UPSC releases the answer keys only after the entire examination cycle is completed, following the declaration of final results. The new decision marks a departure from that practice and will allow aspirants to access the answer keys immediately after the prelims.

Earlier, Senior Advocate Jaideep Gupta assisted by Advcoate Pranjal Kishore, the amicus curiae appointed by the Court for assistance in the matter, had suggested that the UPSC should publish a provisional answer key the next day of the preliminary examination. In an affidavit filed on May 15, the UPSC opposed this suggestion, saying that it would be "counter-productive" and "would lead to uncertainty and delay in the finalisation of the exam."

However, in its latest affidavit filed on September 20, the UPSC revised its stand and said that it has taken a "conscious and well-considered decision" to publish the provisional answer key after the preliminary examination.

After the release of the provisional answer keys, representations/objections will be invited from the candidates who appeared in the exam. Each representation/objection should be supported by at least three authoritative sources. The provisional answer key, as well as the representations/objections, will be placed before a panel of experts on the concerned subject. The experts' panel will finalise the answer keys, which will be the basis for the declaration of results. The final answer keys will be published after the declaration of the final results.

The UPSC said that the decision will be implemented expeditiously. The Commission added that this decision will address the greivances raised by the petitioner.

“The decision taken by the UPSC is considered to be an effective and adequate redressal of the grievances raised in the petition and to enhance the level of transparency in the functioning of the UPSC,” the affidavit stated.

The writ petition was filed in 2024, challenging the UPSC's practice of publishing the marks, cut-off marks and answer keys of CS(P) examination, “only” after the entire process of Civil Services Examination is over.

The petitioners have highlighted that the Civil Services Examination is spread over nearly a year, from notification to the final results, yet UPSC publishes the preliminary answer keys and cut-off marks only after the entire process concludes. As a result, candidates who do not qualify for the mains remain in the dark about their marks, the minimum cut-off, and the basis of their rejection. This, they argue, leaves aspirants “completely clueless” about their performance and denies them an opportunity to assess whether they fell short of the cut-off or whether their exclusion was justified.

It was contended that the withholding of answer keys, marks, and cut-offs creates an opaque system where candidates are deprived of their right to know the basis of evaluation. The petitioners cited instances such as the 2021 prelims, where answer keys released belatedly revealed discrepancies. According to them, candidates who had given correct answers were wrongly rejected, while others with incorrect answers were advanced, but by then, it was too late to seek redressal as the selection process had already concluded.

The petition further alleged that UPSC intentionally delays disclosure to render objections infructuous. For example, the answer key for CSE (Prelims) 2022 had not been published even at the time of filing, which, the petitioners claim, prevents genuine grievances from surfacing before appointments are made. Such a practice, they argue, undermines transparency, leads to serious irregularities in candidate selection, and denies deserving aspirants their rightful opportunity to compete further.

The matter is likely to be listed before a bench comprising Justice PS Narasimha and Justice AS Chandurkar on October 6

Case : Himanshu Kumar and others v. Union of India and others | WP(c) No.118/2024

AoR: Rajeev Kumar Dubey