Union Public Service Commission holds Preliminary Examination of the Civil Services Examination during May (Notification for Preliminary Exam, is generally issued during November/December).

Reservation is made for candidates belonging to Scheduled- Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Other Backward Classes in respect of vacancies as may be fixed by the Government.

Centres of Examination:
Agartala, Ahmedabad, Aizawl, Aligarh, Allahabad, Aurangabad, Bangalore, Bareilly, Bhopal, Mumbai (Bombay), Kolkata (Calcutta), Chandigarh, Kochi (Cochin), Cuttack, Dehradun, Delhi, Dharwar, Dispur (Guwahati), Gangtok, Hyderabad, Impbal, Itanagar, Jaipur, Jammu, Jodhpur, Jorhat, Kohima, Lucknow, Chemiai (Madras), Madurai, Nagpur, Panaji (Goa), Patna, Pondicherry, Portblair, Raipur, Ranchi, Sambalpur, Shillong, Shimla, Srinagar, Tirupati, Thiruvananthapuram (Trivandrum), Udaipur and Vishakhapatnam.

Note: Blind Candidates, will however, be required to take the Examination at any one of the six centres viz. Chennai (Madras), Delhi, Hyderabad, Kolkata (Calcutta), Lucknow and Mumbai (Bombay).