About IES

• The Indian Economic Service (IES / Service) is an organized Group ‘A’ Central Service.
• The Service works with the objective of institutionalising professional capacity to undertake economic analysis within the Government and use it for designing and formulating development policies, strengthening delivery systems, and monitoring and evaluating public programmes.
• The Cadre Controlling Authority of the IES is the Department of Economic Affairs, Ministry of Finance and the Service is managed on the basis of the Indian Economic Service Rules, as amended from time to time.
• A distinguishing feature of the Service is that its Cadre posts are spread across 72 different Ministries/ Departments of the Central Government. It is an inter-Ministerial and inter-Departmental Service. Officers serve in a diverse range of subject areas, such as finance & economic affairs; social sector including health, education, rural development; agriculture & allied sectors including food processing; industry & services; commerce & external affairs; infrastructure & technology and energy & environment.
• Besides manning Cadre posts, IES officers go on deputation to serve in various domestic and international organizations such as UN bodies, foreign governments, state governments and regulatory bodies. Officers from the service are also appointed on deputation to posts in the Central Ministries/ Departments under the Central Staffing Scheme.
• As economists within the government the officers of IES play a vital role in policy making. As part of macro-economic policy makers, they deal with quantification of policy objectives to formulation, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of policy outcomes. They also play a key role in formulating sectoral policies in collaboration with sector experts. They also play a vital part of the monitoring and evaluation mechanisms of the Government. They are the in-house experts for the Government offering economic inputs for evidence-based policy.