KVS teacher salary

A KVS teacher is a teacher in a Kendriya Vidyalaya, and the three teaching grades sit at Levels 6, 7 and 8 of the 7th Central Pay Commission pay matrix, with entry basic pay of Rs. 35,400 for a primary teacher, Rs. 44,900 for a trained graduate teacher and Rs. 47,600 for a post graduate teacher. Those levels are fixed by Schedule II of the Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangathan (Appointment, Promotion, Seniority etc.) Rules, 1971, as amended and circulated by Office Memorandum F.11022/1/2019-KVS/RPS/RR dated 27 June 2025, and repeated on the pay scale line of every post in Recruitment Notification 01/2025. At the dearness allowance of 60% in force from 1 January 2026, the in-hand in an X class city runs Rs. 67,356 for a PRT and Rs. 88,584 for a PGT.

The entry level is not the whole grade. Schedule II gives each teaching post three levels rather than one: an entry scale, a senior scale and a selection scale. A PGT who reaches the selection scale draws Level 11, starting at Rs. 67,700, which is a level above the Vice-Principal, while remaining a PGT. That structure is the single largest thing missing from most accounts of what a Kendriya Vidyalaya teacher earns over a career, and it is set out below with the office order that grants it.

The Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangathan is an autonomous organisation under the Ministry of Education, Department of School Education and Literacy, running 1,288 Kendriya Vidyalayas including three abroad, through a headquarters at New Delhi and 25 regional offices. Its teaching posts are classified as equivalent to Group B, not as Group B under the Central Civil Services (Classification, Control and Appeal) Rules, 1965, and that distinction decides more than it appears to: it is why the Unified Pension Scheme does not reach a KVS teacher.

This page sets out the pay level by level, the senior and selection scales, the in-hand across city classes, the qualification and age rules, the joint KVS and NVS recruitment that replaced the standalone KVS examination, the two tier scheme of examination and its two different negative marking rates, the promotion routes out of each teaching grade, the pension position, and the income tax. A take-home figure at any level can be worked out on the salary by pay level calculator.

Pay and in-hand by teaching post

The three teaching grades differ by the classes taught and by one level of the pay matrix each. Every figure below is the first cell of the level, which is what a direct recruit draws on joining.

The Librarian sits alongside the TGT at Level 7 with the same entry basic of Rs. 44,900 and the same three-scale structure. Primary Teacher (Music) sits alongside the PRT at Level 6. Special Educator posts exist at both the TGT and the PRT levels, at Rs. 44,900 and Rs. 35,400 respectively, and Schedule II classifies the Special Educator (PRT) as Group B outright rather than as equivalent to Group B.

Each level in the table deep-links into the salary by pay level calculator, which recomputes take-home from the dearness allowance rate currently in force rather than from a figure typed into this page.

The three scales every teaching post carries

Schedule II lists three pay levels against each teaching post, and a teacher moves up them without changing post or designation. This is the part of KVS pay that has no direct equivalent in an ordinary central government grade, where movement above the entry level comes through promotion or through the Modified Assured Career Progression scheme.

The consequence at the top of the table is the striking one. A PGT on the selection scale is at Level 11, Rs. 67,700 to Rs. 2,08,700, while a Vice-Principal is at Level 10, Rs. 56,100 to Rs. 1,77,500. The classroom teacher on the third scale is a level above the school’s second-in-command, and a PRT on the selection scale is at Level 8, the level a PGT starts at.

The qualifying service is long. The KVS office order granting the PGT selection scale for 2025, F.11058/2026/PGT/S.S./KVS(HQ) dated 16 July 2026, sanctions Level 11 on the recommendation of a Departmental Promotion Committee and with the approval of the competent authority, in accordance with Ministry of Human Resource Development letters No. F.5-180/86-UT-1 dated 12 August 1987, 3 November 1987 and 6 February 1989, on the condition that the teacher has completed twelve years of service in the senior scale on the post of PGT and is working on that post on the date of sanction. The individual entries in that order show the pattern in service dates: a PGT who joined on 10 February 1994 reached the senior scale on 10 February 2006, twelve years later, and the selection scale from 1 January 2025.

Pay on grant of the selection scale is fixed under Fundamental Rule 22(I)(a)(2) as applied to KVS employees, and the same office order gives the teacher an option exercisable within one month of receipt: fixation from the date the selection scale falls due, or fixation from the date of the next increment in the senior scale of the old post. Where the second option is taken, pay is fixed at the same stage in the selection scale if that stage exists, and otherwise at the next stage after allowing the normal increment in the senior scale. The option once given is final. Selection is on the basis of annual confidential reports and service records, and the order records that the grant is recoverable if the teacher is later found ineligible for any reason.

Because the scales are graded pay levels rather than a separate scheme, the annual increment continues to run at 3% within whichever level applies, and pay fixation on promotion rules govern the move when a teacher does change post.

How the pay is built

The gross is basic pay plus the standard central government allowances, and the in-hand is the gross less the pension contribution. A PGT at the Level 8 entry cell, posted in an X class city that is also one of the 19 higher-rate transport allowance cities, works out as follows.

The pension contribution is the only certain deduction, and it is the one that varies with pay. The Central Government Health Scheme contribution of Rs. 650 a month for Levels 7 to 11 and the Rs. 60 Group B premium under the Central Government Employees Group Insurance Scheme, which are the two further lines on a central civil servant’s payslip at the same level, do not follow from the pay level alone for an autonomous body employee. Whether a given KVS teacher carries either deduction turns on whether the scheme has been extended to the Sangathan, not on Level 8. The figures above are therefore stated before any health scheme or insurance deduction, which is why they read slightly higher than the in-hand at the identical level in a central government post such as the Income Tax Officer.

The same build-up applies at the other two levels with each level’s basic pay substituted. The take-home salary article works through the general computation, and the 7th CPC salary calculator does it for any cell.

In-hand across the city classes

House rent allowance is 30%, 20% and 10% of basic pay in X, Y and Z class cities under Office Memorandum No. 2/5/2017-E.II(B) dated 7 July 2017, at the rates in force since 1 January 2024 because dearness allowance crossed 50%. Transport allowance runs on a separate list: Rs. 3,600 a month for Levels 3 to 8 in the 19 higher-rate urban agglomerations under Office Memorandum No. 21/5/2017-E.II(B) dated 7 July 2017, and Rs. 1,800 everywhere else, with dearness allowance paid on top in both cases. A Kendriya Vidyalaya in a small town therefore pays materially less than one in a metro on identical basic pay.

The Y and Z rows take the lower transport allowance slab, which is the common case outside the 19 listed agglomerations. A Y class city that appears on the transport allowance list adds Rs. 2,880 a month to the figures shown. The in-hand column is gross less the 10% pension contribution and before any health scheme or insurance deduction.

What each post teaches, and what it needs

The three grades form a ladder by stage of schooling, and the academic qualification rises with it. The requirements below are the essential qualifications printed against each post in Notification 01/2025 and in Schedule II.

The Central Teacher Eligibility Test, conducted by the Central Board of Secondary Education, is a hard gate for the PRT and the TGT and no gate at all for the PGT. The certificate must have been issued on or before the closing date for the online application, so a candidate awaiting a result cannot apply on the strength of an expected pass. The CTET condition applies to the Limited Departmental Examination route into the TGT grade as well as to direct recruitment, following the National Council for Teacher Education guidelines, which closes the obvious workaround of entering the grade as a departmental candidate without it.

The B.Ed requirement admits three alternatives at both the TGT and PGT levels: a B.Ed degree from an NCTE recognised institution with at least 50% marks, a three year integrated B.Ed and M.Ed with 50% marks, or a four year integrated degree with 50% marks that includes a B.Ed component. A PGT may also qualify on an integrated post graduate course in the subject with 50% marks including a B.Ed component. Proficiency to teach in both Hindi and English medium is an essential qualification for the PGT, not a desirable one.

Age limit and relaxation

The upper age limits are 30 years for a PRT, 35 for a TGT or Librarian and 40 for a PGT, reckoned against the cut-off date fixed in the notification, which for Notification 01/2025 is 4 December 2025. The minimum age is 18 years for every post.

The 10 year relaxation for women is the provision most often left out of summaries of KVS eligibility, and it is substantial: a woman candidate may apply for a PGT post up to 50 years of age before any category relaxation is counted, and up to 55 if she also belongs to a Scheduled Caste or Scheduled Tribe. It is confined to the four teaching and library posts named and does not extend to the Principal, Vice-Principal or non-teaching posts. Schedule II states the same relaxations as applicable under the Government of India and KVS rules issued from time to time, so the notification is the operative statement of the figures for any given recruitment cycle.

Recruitment: the joint KVS and NVS notification

The standalone KVS teacher examination has gone. Recruitment Notification 01/2025, published on 13 November 2025, is issued in the joint name of the Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangathan and the Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti, and its opening paragraphs state that the Central Board of Secondary Education, on behalf of KVS and NVS, invites online applications for direct recruitment to teaching and non-teaching posts in both organisations. Candidates are directed to the CBSE, KVS and Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti websites and warned that no other source is authentic for the recruitment.

One notification, one application, one examination, two employers. A candidate who clears the process may be posted to a Kendriya Vidyalaya or to a Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya depending on the post applied for, and the pay is the same at the same level, though an NVS teacher additionally draws a 10% special allowance for performing residential duties that a KVS teacher does not. Selected candidates may be posted anywhere in India, and the notification states flatly that a request to change station or region on selection will not be entertained under any circumstances.

The Limited Departmental Examination route runs separately and remains a KVS process. The examination for promotion to teaching and non-teaching posts was notified on 11 December 2025 and conducted on 26 April 2026, again with the CBSE as the conducting agency, in OMR mode with answer keys published for challenge at Rs. 1,000 a question.

The scheme of examination

Paragraph 11 of Notification 01/2025 sets a two tier written examination followed by an interview for every teaching post: Assistant Commissioner, Principal, Vice-Principal, PGT, TGT including Librarian and PRT, along with the Administrative Officer, Finance Officer, Assistant Engineer and Junior Translator posts. The merit list is prepared by giving 85% weight to Tier-2 and 15% to the interview, which carries 100 marks. Stenographer and Junior Secretariat Assistant posts take a skill test instead of an interview, and the Assistant Section Officer, Senior Secretariat Assistant, Lab Attendant and Multi-Tasking Staff posts take neither.

Tier-1 is a preliminary qualifying examination in OMR objective mode, of two hours, with no separate time limit for any part.

Tier-1 is a screening test only. It shortlists candidates for Tier-2 in the ratio of 1:10 against notified vacancies, with everyone tying on the marks of the last candidate in that band also carried forward, and the Tier-1 score does not enter the final merit. A combined Tier-1 may be held for several posts at once, and a candidate who applies for more than one post placed in a combined paper is ranked in each of those merit lists on the strength of the single attempt.

Tier-2 is the subject knowledge examination, separate for each post, bilingual in Hindi and English except for PGT (Modern Indian Language) and TGT (3rd Language) where the paper is in the language concerned. It runs two hours and thirty minutes and combines pen-paper and OMR: 60 objective questions for 60 marks and 10 descriptive questions for 40 marks, 100 marks in total. Candidates are shortlisted from Tier-2 for interview in the ratio of 1:3 against notified vacancies.

Negative marking runs at two different rates and catches candidates out. In Tier-1 each question carries 3 marks and 1 mark is deducted for a wrong answer, a deduction of one third of the question value. In the objective part of Tier-2 each question carries 1 mark and 0.25 marks are deducted. Darkening more than one response is treated as a wrong response and attracts the same deduction in each tier. Unanswered questions attract nothing either way. There is no provision for re-evaluation in either tier.

Vacancies notified in 2025

The post-wise tables in Notification 01/2025 add to 9,126 posts in the Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangathan and 5,841 in the Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti, a combined 14,967. The KVS teaching side alone accounts for 7,771 of them.

The Primary Teacher grade is the largest single teaching cadre in the Sangathan by a wide margin. Schedule II records 16,182 sanctioned PRT posts against the 2024-25 workload, compared with 1,321 Librarian posts, 802 Head Master posts, 1,184 Principal posts and 524 Vice-Principal posts. Within the PGT grade the largest 2025 recruitments were Physics at 213 posts, Chemistry at 204 and Computer Science at 176, and the smallest was Bio-technology at four. Within the TGT grade, Sanskrit led at 529 posts, followed by Mathematics at 413 and Social Studies at 327.

The central government jobs hub sets the KVS route alongside the Staff Selection Commission and Union Public Service Commission examinations.

Promotion out of the teaching grades

Schedule II fixes the method of recruitment for every post as a percentage split, and the splits decide how much of a career can be built inside the Sangathan.

The PRT grade is filled 100% by direct recruitment, so nobody is promoted into it. The route out of it is the Head Master, a post with 802 sanctioned places at Level 7 entry, filled 66.67% by promotion from Primary Teachers with at least five years of regular service as a PRT and 33.33% by Limited Departmental Examination. A PRT with five years of service and CTET Paper II may also compete for the 33.33% Limited Departmental Examination share of the TGT (Hindi and English) grade, which is otherwise 66.67% direct recruitment.

The TGT grade for Mathematics, Science and Social Studies is likewise 66.67% direct recruitment and 33.33% Limited Departmental Examination. TGT (Sanskrit), TGT (Art Education), TGT (Work Experience), TGT (Physical and Health Education) and the Librarian post are 100% direct recruitment, with no departmental route into any of them.

The PGT grade is 66.67% direct recruitment and 33.33% Limited Departmental Examination from TGTs with at least three years of regular service in the grade who hold the qualifications prescribed for direct recruitment as a PGT. The feeder chain is fixed subject by subject: TGT (Maths) feeds PGT (Maths), TGT (Science) feeds PGT (Physics, Chemistry and Biology), and TGT (Social Studies) feeds PGT (History, Geography and Economics). Two subjects are closed to it entirely: PGT (Commerce) and PGT (Bio-technology) are filled 100% by direct recruitment, so a serving TGT has no promotion route into either.

Above the classroom, the Vice-Principal is filled by selection at Level 10 and the Principal 50% by Limited Departmental Examination from Vice-Principals with at least three years of regular service in the grade and 50% by direct recruitment. The direct entry to Principal is not narrow: the qualification admits a serving Principal at Level 12 anywhere in central, state or autonomous service, a Vice-Principal with three years at Level 10, twelve years of regular service as a PGT or Lecturer at Level 8, or twelve years of combined PGT and Vice-Principal service. Above the school, a Principal may move into KVS administration as Assistant Commissioner or Deputy Commissioner in a regional or headquarters office.

Where regular promotion is slow, the three-scale structure described above does the work that the Modified Assured Career Progression scheme does elsewhere, moving a teacher up in pay without a change of post.

Vice-Principal and Principal pay

Both are classified as equivalent to Group A. The Vice-Principal takes direct recruits between 35 and 45 years of age and the Principal between 35 and 50, with five years of relaxation in the upper limit for a serving KVS employee in each case. Both carry two years of probation for a direct recruit. The Principal at Level 12 draws the same entry basic as a Deputy Commissioner and as an Assistant Commissioner (Academic or Finance) in the KVS headquarters cadre, whose pay levels are confirmed in the Sangathan’s own monthly remuneration disclosure drawn from the July 2026 pay bill.

Neither post is closed to outside candidates, which corrects a common assumption. Notification 01/2025 advertised 134 Principal and 58 Vice-Principal posts in KVS for open competition, alongside 93 Principal posts in NVS.

Allowances

Beyond basic pay, a KVS teacher draws the standard central government allowances at the standard rates: dearness allowance at 60% of basic pay from 1 January 2026 under Office Memorandum No. 1/1(i)/2026-E.II(B) dated 22 April 2026, house rent allowance at 30%, 20% or 10% of basic pay by city class, and transport allowance by pay level and city with dearness allowance paid on it. Children Education Allowance is drawn on the same terms as in a central government post.

There is no separate teaching allowance, and no allowance attaches to a KVS posting as such. The one KVS-side allowance in the neighbouring organisation is the 10% special allowance for residential duties that Notification 01/2025 grants to a selected candidate in NVS, and it is not admissible in KVS at all. A comparison of the two payslips is in the NVS teacher salary article.

Probation and the terms of appointment

Every teaching post in Schedule II carries two years of probation for a direct recruit, and the notification adds that the period may be extended at the discretion of the competent authority. During probation the services of a probationer may be terminated at any time without assigning any reason. Performance during probation is assessed, and the probation rules that govern a central civil servant supply the general pattern, though the operative terms for a KVS teacher are the KVS rules and the appointment order.

Appointment is to an all-India cadre in practice. The notification states that a selected candidate may be posted anywhere in India on initial posting and that no request for a change of station or region will be entertained. Seniority within a grade is regulated under the KVS (Appointment, Promotion, Seniority etc.) Rules, 1971, and the Sangathan publishes the seniority list grade by grade, which matters because both the Limited Departmental Examination routes described above run on a qualifying-cum-seniority basis rather than on marks alone.

Pension: the National Pension System, and why UPS does not reach a KVS teacher

A KVS teacher appointed on or after 1 January 2004 is on the National Pension System, contributing 10% of basic pay plus dearness allowance each month, with a matching employer contribution credited to the individual corpus and no effect on take-home pay. The Old Pension Scheme is closed to post-2004 entrants, so every serving KVS teacher at the entry and middle grades today is on a contributory scheme.

The Unified Pension Scheme does not reach a KVS teacher, and the reason is the classification set out at the top of this page. UPS was notified by Department of Financial Services notification F. No. FX-1/3/2024-PR dated 24 January 2025 as an option under the National Pension System for central government employees, and the Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority describes it in exactly those terms. It is implemented for civil servants by the Central Civil Services (Implementation of the Unified Pension Scheme under the National Pension System) Rules, 2025, notified as G.S.R. 599(E) on 2 September 2025. Those are Central Civil Services rules. A KVS teacher holds a post in an autonomous body classified as equivalent to Group B rather than a Central Civil Services post, and no order has extended the scheme to the Sangathan, so the position for a KVS teacher is the National Pension System without the UPS option.

The pattern is the same one that keeps an All India Service officer outside the same rules for a different reason, worked through in the IAS salary article: the scheme reaches a category of employee only through an instrument that applies to that category, and the Central Civil Services rules are not that instrument for everyone on the National Pension System. The OPS versus NPS versus UPS calculator sets out what the three schemes pay on identical service, and the difference is what a KVS teacher forgoes.

Income tax on a KVS teacher’s salary

Tax is nil at the entry cell of all three teaching posts under the new regime, and the arithmetic is worth stating because it is the reason the in-hand column carries no tax line.

A PGT drawing Rs. 96,200 a month has an annual salary of Rs. 11,54,400. The standard deduction of Rs. 75,000 at serial 2 of the Table in Section 19(1) of the Income-tax Act, 2025 brings it to Rs. 10,79,400. Tax under the Table to Section 202(1), at the rates charged for the assessment year by Section 3 of the Finance Act, 2026, is Rs. 20,000 on the band from Rs. 4 lakh to Rs. 8 lakh at 5% and Rs. 27,940 on the remainder at 10%, that is Rs. 47,940. The rebate under Section 156 is available up to a total income of Rs. 12 lakh and exceeds that figure, so the liability is nil. A TGT and a PRT fall further below the threshold.

Tax begins to bite only once basic pay has risen enough through increments and the senior scale to push total income past Rs. 12 lakh after the standard deduction, at which point marginal relief limits the jump. The income tax slabs for AY 2027-28 article carries the full rate table and the crossover point, and the income tax calculator computes it for any figure.

How KVS pay compares at the same level

Because the teaching posts sit at the standard pay levels of the matrix, a KVS teacher’s basic pay, dearness allowance, house rent allowance and transport allowance line up exactly with any other post at the same level. A TGT at Level 7 draws the same Rs. 91,070 gross in an X class city as an Income Tax Inspector or an Assistant Section Officer at the same level, and a PRT at Level 6 the same Rs. 73,020 gross as a Junior Engineer recruited through the Staff Selection Commission. What differs is the work, the qualification and the recruitment route, not the money at the top of the payslip.

The differences show up below the gross line rather than above it. A central government post at Level 7 carries the Central Government Health Scheme contribution and the group insurance premium as fixed deductions and offers the Unified Pension Scheme as an option; a KVS post at Level 7 carries neither deduction as an automatic consequence of the level and offers no UPS option. Against that, the KVS three-scale structure moves a teacher to Level 8 and then Level 10 inside the same post, which a central government Level 7 grade reaches only through promotion or MACP. The salary by pay level chart shows the entry pay for every level side by side.

What the 8th Central Pay Commission may change

Nothing has changed yet. The 8th Central Pay Commission was constituted by Department of Expenditure Resolution F. No. 01-01/2025-E.III(A) dated 3 November 2025 and has not reported. Level 6 still starts at Rs. 35,400, Level 7 at Rs. 44,900 and Level 8 at Rs. 47,600, and Recruitment Notification 01/2025 prints those figures as the pay of the posts.

Every 8th CPC figure for a KVS teacher in circulation is arithmetic performed on an assumed fitment factor, and no fitment factor has been recommended, accepted or notified. The terms of reference cover allowances alongside pay, so the house rent allowance percentages and the transport allowance slabs that make up a teacher’s gross are equally open. What is settled is the current pay: Rs. 47,600 basic, Rs. 96,200 gross and Rs. 88,584 in hand for a PGT in an X class city at a dearness allowance of 60%. The 8th Central Pay Commission article tracks what has actually been notified.

Related Articles

• NVS teacher salary
• Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangathan
• Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti
• Central Teacher Eligibility Test
• Salary by pay level
• Salary by pay level calculator
• 7th CPC salary calculator
• Income tax calculator
• MACP calculator
• OPS versus NPS versus UPS calculator
• Income Tax Inspector salary
• Income Tax Officer
• Assistant Section Officer salary
• Junior Engineer salary
• Staff Nurse salary
• SSC CGL salary
• IAS salary
• Central government jobs
• Central government employees in India
• Pay matrix
• 7th Central Pay Commission
• 8th Central Pay Commission
• Take-home salary of central government employees
• Dearness allowance
• House rent allowance
• Transport allowance
• Annual increment
• Pay fixation on promotion
• Modified Assured Career Progression
• Departmental Promotion Committee
• Direct recruitment
• Seniority list
• Probation in central government service
• Fundamental Rules
• National Pension System
• Unified Pension Scheme
• Old Pension Scheme
• Central Government Employees Group Insurance Scheme
• Central Government Health Scheme
• Income-tax Act, 2025
• Income tax slabs for AY 2027-28
• Standard deduction

External references

• Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangathan
• Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti
• Ministry of Education
• Central Board of Secondary Education
• National Council for Teacher Education
• Department of Expenditure
• Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority