IPS salary

An IPS officer enters the Indian Police Service as an Assistant Superintendent of Police at Level 10 of the 7th CPC pay matrix, with an entry basic of Rs. 56,100, and rises through the police ranks to the apex Level 17. The Indian Police Service is entered through the UPSC Civil Services Examination , the same examination as the IAS and the Indian Revenue Service , and at the current dearness allowance of 60 per cent the entry in-hand is about Rs. 1,01,000 a month in an X-class city.

This page sets out that pay: the entry basic and how the in-hand is built, the rank-and-pay ladder from Assistant Superintendent to Director General, the pay edge the IAS carries that the IPS does not, the training, and the pension. The exact in-hand at entry is worked out by the salary by pay level calculator , set to Level 10.

Pay at entry and in-hand

An IPS officer starts at Level 10, the entry grade for the directly recruited Group A services, with an entry basic of Rs. 56,100, the same starting cell as the IAS and the Indian Revenue Service .

The in-hand of about Rs. 1,01,000 is for an X-class city, and it is identical to the IAS entry pay, because both are Level 10. Income tax is not nil here: the annual taxable income crosses the Rs. 12 lakh rebate limit under the new regime, so a monthly tax of about Rs. 7,050 applies. Many IPS field postings come with an official residence and vehicle, in which case the officer draws the licence-fee rate rather than the full house rent allowance. The salary by pay level calculator recomputes the figure for a given city.

The rank and pay ladder

IPS pay is a ladder of ranks, each a level of the pay matrix , and the rank rather than the years fixes the pay. The police ladder is longer than the administrative one, and it uses three levels, 13A, 14, and 16, that the IAS ladder does not.

The Level 13 Selection Grade cell is Rs. 1,23,100 after the 2017 revision of the level’s index of rationalisation, which raised the original 7th CPC cell of Rs. 1,18,500 for every service. Level 17 is the apex scale, a fixed Rs. 2,25,000 with no increments, held by the Director General heading a large state police force and by the Directors of the Central Bureau of Investigation and the Intelligence Bureau, the same apex scale as a Secretary to the Government of India. Very few officers reach the top, and the senior ranks come through selection and vacancy.

The IAS pay edge the IPS does not get

At entry the IPS and the IAS are paid the same, and this is where a common belief that all the civil services are paid alike comes from. They are not paid alike higher up, and the difference is a specific rule.

The IAS (Pay) Rules, 2016 give an IAS officer two additional increments on promotion to the Junior Administrative Grade at Level 12 and again to the Selection Grade at Level 13. Those increments are given to the IAS only; they are not extended to the IPS or the Indian Forest Service. The effect is that a same-batch IAS officer is placed a little higher within each level than an IPS officer promoted at the same time, so the IAS basic runs ahead at the senior grades, by a reported Rs. 13,000 to Rs. 17,000 a month at the higher levels. The non-functional upgradation that lets some organised Group A services catch up to the IAS also does not apply to the IPS. So while an IPS officer and an IAS officer of the same batch start identically, the IAS draws more at the middle and senior grades. The IAS salary page sets out that edge from the other side.

Training

A selected IPS officer trains before taking charge. After a common Foundation Course with the other services at the Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration in Mussoorie, the officer moves to the Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel National Police Academy in Hyderabad, the central police training academy, for the professional police training in law, investigation, weapons, and field craft, and then to the allotted state cadre for district training. Only after the training and the probation is the officer confirmed.

An All India Service under the Home Ministry

The Indian Police Service is one of the three All India Services, with the IAS and the Indian Forest Service, and this shapes the pay and the career. An All India Service officer is recruited by the Union but allotted to a state cadre, and serves both the state and the centre.

The difference from the IAS is the controlling ministry. The Ministry of Home Affairs is the cadre-controlling authority for the IPS, where the Department of Personnel and Training controls the IAS, so the Home Ministry manages the IPS recruitment intake, the cadre allotment, and the empanelment for central postings such as the Central Armed Police Forces, the Central Bureau of Investigation, and the Intelligence Bureau. The pay is fixed by the Union under the pay matrix and the IPS (Pay) Rules, and when the officer serves a state the salary is paid from the state’s funds, which is why the pay is uniform across the country while the posting and the paying government change with the cadre.

The promotion timeline

The pay rises through the annual increment within a rank and through promotion up the ranks. The timeline is reported rather than fixed, because it turns on the vacancies in the officer’s state cadre and, at the top, on empanelment at the centre.

The commonly reported timeline runs to Superintendent of Police in about six to nine years, Deputy Inspector General in about fourteen to eighteen, Inspector General in about eighteen to twenty-two, Additional Director General in about twenty-five to thirty, and the Director General rank after about thirty years for the few who reach it. These figures vary widely by cadre, so they are a guide, not a schedule.

Allowances

Beyond the three core allowances, an IPS officer draws the standard entitlements. The dearness allowance is 60 per cent of basic, the house rent allowance is by city class where the officer is not in an official residence, and the transport allowance is the Level 9-and-above rate. Being a uniformed service, the IPS draws a Dress Allowance of Rs. 20,000 a year for officers, paid once a year with the July salary, for the upkeep of the uniform. There is no general IPS-specific field allowance at the officer level; special or hardship allowances that some officers draw are tied to the posting, such as a Central Armed Police Forces deputation, not to the IPS rank itself.

Pension

An IPS officer who joined after 1 January 2004 is covered by the National Pension System , contributing 10 per cent of basic plus dearness allowance against the government’s 14 per cent, or by the Unified Pension Scheme if opted from 1 April 2025, which assures 50 per cent of the average of the last 12 months’ basic pay after 25 years of service. The Old Pension Scheme is closed to post-2004 entrants.

How IPS pay compares

The IPS shares its entry pay with the IAS and the Indian Revenue Service , all three at Level 10 and Rs. 56,100, and all three climb the same pay matrix, but the IPS ladder is the police one, running through the Superintendent, the Inspector General, and the Director General ranks, and it lacks the two-increment edge that lifts the IAS a little higher at the senior grades. Against the posts filled through the SSC CGL examination, the IPS enters far above, at Level 10 rather than the Level 4 to 8 of those posts. The salary by pay level chart shows the entry pay at every level, and the central government jobs hub sets the services side by side.

See also

• IAS salary
• Indian Revenue Service
• Civil Services Examination
• Union Public Service Commission
• Central Armed Police Forces
• CAPF Constable salary
• Central government jobs
• SSC CGL salary
• Salary by pay level
• Salary by pay level calculator
• 7th CPC salary calculator
• Pay matrix
• 7th Central Pay Commission
• Take-home salary of central government employees
• Dearness allowance
• House rent allowance
• Transport allowance
• National Pension System
• Unified Pension Scheme
• Income tax for government employees
• Central government employees in India

External references

• Ministry of Home Affairs
• Union Public Service Commission
• Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel National Police Academy
• Department of Expenditure
• Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority