LBSNAA and IAS Training: Foundation Course to Phase II

IAS training starts at the Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration (LBSNAA) in Mussoorie and takes about two years. It runs in four parts: a Foundation Course shared with other services, the IAS professional course Phase I, a year of district training in your state cadre, and Phase II back at the academy. Later in your career come three mid-career phases, and the pay rules make two of them a condition for promotion.

This guide follows LBSNAA's own description of each phase. LBSNAA is an attached office of the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT), headed by a Director at the level of Secretary to the Government of India.

The academy

The National Academy of Administration was set up in Mussoorie in 1959. A common Foundation Course for the IAS, the IFS and other central services followed in 1960, and the "sandwich pattern" of Phase I, district training and Phase II in 1969. The academy took Lal Bahadur Shastri's name in 1972, and "National" was added in 1973. Besides induction training, it runs the IAS mid-career programmes and induction training for officers promoted to the IAS from the State Civil Services.

Two sets of rules govern this period. Under the CSE Rules 2026, an IAS officer is appointed on probation for two years, which can be extended. Under the IAS (Probation) Rules, 1954, officer trainees are under the disciplinary control of the Director while at the academy.

Foundation Course

The Foundation Course lasts 14 weeks and usually runs from September to December. It is common to the All India Services, the Indian Foreign Service and the Group A central services, and LBSNAA puts the intake at over 650 officer trainees a year across the academy and partner institutions. Its aim is to orient new officers to the country's administrative, social, economic and political setting and to build ties between the services.

• Teaching covers law, public administration, economics, political science, management and behavioural science, history and culture, and ICT.
• Every trainee learns a language. All India Service officers take the language of the state cadre they have been allotted, if the allotment has been made before the course.
• Outside the classroom there are a one-week Himalayan trek, a one-week village visit with a report on the villages, and events such as India Day.

Skipping it is not an option: the CSE Rules 2026 say a candidate allotted to an All India or Group A service who does not join the mandatory Foundation Course without an exemption is liable to lose the candidature.

Phase I: the professional course

Phase I, the IAS professional course, lasts about 20 weeks, from December to May. It has three blocks: about 12 weeks of academic instruction, a winter study tour of about seven weeks and a week of block leave. LBSNAA's stated aim is to prepare officers for the assignments of their first ten years.

• Classes. About 400 teaching hours across five subjects: law; basic economic principles and the Indian economy; political concepts and the Constitution; management and behavioural sciences; and public administration. ICT and the language of the allotted cadre are taught as well.
• Winter study tour. Called Bharat Darshan, it takes trainees in groups of about 18 to 20 across the country, each covering nearly 20,000 km, with attachments to the armed forces, public and private sector bodies, municipal bodies, voluntary agencies and tribal areas.

DoPT's cadre allocation policy of January 2026 asks for the IAS cadre allocation to be done, preferably, before this professional course begins.

District training

Then comes a year, 52 weeks, in your state cadre, which LBSNAA describes as learning by seeing and learning by doing.

• State academy. A spell at the state's administrative training institute, from 3 to 12 weeks depending on the state.
• Attachments. Around 25 to 30 weeks with district offices, supervised by the District Collector: the Collectorate, Zila Parishad, SDM and Tehsildar offices, the police, the district judge, forest, health and engineering offices, municipal bodies and block offices.
• Independent charges. Two or three subordinate posts held on your own, typically Block Development and Panchayat Officer and Tehsildar for 4 to 8 weeks each, and in some cases Executive Officer of a municipal council or even SDM.
• State secretariat. About a week attached to secretaries at the state headquarters.
• Assignments. Monthly notes to your cadre counsellor at the academy, a village study, the law cases you heard and decided, and language work.

Phase II

Phase II brings the batch back to Mussoorie for about eight weeks, from the third week of May into June, to compare and reflect on the district year. The academy holds seminars on being an effective SDO, which its Phase II page calls the trainees' first posting, and on serving as CEO of a Zila Parishad, Municipal Commissioner and District Magistrate. There is also a week-long foreign study tour.

The induction training also earns a Master's Degree in Public Management, recognised by Jawaharlal Nehru University: 64 credits over four semesters. LBSNAA's list of induction training for direct recruits has one more item after Phase II, an "Assistant Secretary-ship".

Mid-career training: Phases III, IV and V

The mid-career programme began in 2007, and LBSNAA has designed and run it since 2010.

Phase	Seniority	Length	LBSNAA's description
Phase III	7 to 9 years	4 weeks	The move from field work to heading a state department or serving as Deputy Secretary or Director in the Government of India.
Phase IV	14 to 16 years	4 weeks	The move from implementation to policy formulation.
Phase V	26 to 28 years	3 weeks	Strategy for officers in posts that shape policy and its implementation.

The IAS (Pay) Rules make Phase III a condition for the Junior Administrative Grade and Phase IV for the Super Time Scale, and an officer with 28 years of service becomes eligible for an increment after completing Phase V. Officers with less than three years of service left after the year they are slotted for a phase are not sent. How these steps fit a whole career is in the IAS career journey, and the pay at each grade in IAS salary.