THE PLAIN-LANGUAGE GUIDE
What does this mean?
Public Service Commissions conduct examinations and advise on the specified recruitment, service and disciplinary matters, subject to listed exceptions and regulations. Consultation duties do not make the Commission the final decision-maker in every case.
Public-service recruitment, tenure safeguards, All-India Services and Public Service Commissions.
Why is this provision here?
Public-service institutions need predictable appointment, independence, continuity and accountability arrangements. This is the particular safeguard or enabling rule described above.
Historical evidenceThis Article number belongs to the original constitutional framework, but its present wording may include later amendments or substitutions. A provision-specific original Assembly debate has not been verified here. The explanation of function above is editorial inference from the text, not an attributed single motive of the framers. The original draft-making archive is a research resource, not proof of a particular historical reason.
The explanation of purpose is an editorial reading of the provision. A drafting motive is attributed only where a linked historical source supports it.
Limits, exceptions & reading carefully
Educational summary of the linked source text. Exceptions, provisos, implementing laws and applicable judgments must be read before applying it to a real case.
Read the official constitutional text
320. Functions of Public Service Commissions.—(1) It shall be the duty
of the Union and the State Public Service Commissions to conduct examinations
for appointments to the services of the Union and the services of the State
respectively.
(2) It shall also be the duty of the Union Public Service Commission, if
requested by any two or more States so to do, to assist those States in framing
and operating schemes of joint recruitment for any services for which candidates
possessing special qualifications are required.
(3) The Union Public Service Commission or the State Public Service
(a) on all matters relating to methods of recruitment to civil
services and for civil posts;
(b) on the principles to be followed in making appointments to civil
services and posts and in making promotions and transfers from one
service to another and on the suitability of candidates for such
appointments, promotions or transfers;
(c) on all disciplinary matters affecting a person serving under the
Government of India or the Government of a State in a civil capacity,
including memorials or petitions relating to such matters;
(d) on any claim by or in respect of a person who is serving or has
served under the Government of India or the Government of a State or
under the Crown in India or under the Government of an Indian State, in
a civil capacity, that any costs incurred by him in defending legal
proceedings instituted against him in respect of acts done or purporting to
be done in the execution of his duty should be paid out of the Consolidated
Fund of India, or, as the case may be, out of the Consolidated Fund of the
State;
(e) on any claim for the award of a pension in respect of injuries
sustained by a person while serving under the Government of India or the
Government of a State or under the Crown in India or under the
Government of an Indian State, in a civil capacity, and any question as to
the amount of any such award,
and it shall be the duty of a Public Service Commission to advise on any matter
so referred to them and on any other matter which the President, or, as the case
may be, the Governor *** of the State, may refer to them:
Provided that the President as respects the all-India services and also as
respects other services and posts in connection with the affairs of the Union, and
the Governor ***, as respects other services and posts in connection with the
affairs of a State, may make regulations specifying the matters in which either
generally, or in any particular class of case or in any particular circumstances, it
shall not be necessary for a Public Service Commission to be consulted.
(4) Nothing in clause (3) shall require a Public Service Commission to be
consulted as respects the manner in which any provision referred to in clause
(4) of article 16 may be made or as respects the manner in which effect may be
given to the provisions of article 335.
(5) All regulations made under the proviso to clause (3) by the President
or the Governor *** of a State shall be laid for not less than fourteen days before
each House of Parliament or the House or each House of the Legislature of the
State, as the case may be, as soon as possible after they are made, and shall be
subject to such modifications, whether by way of repeal or amendment, as both
Houses of Parliament or the House or both Houses of the Legislature of the State
may make during the session in which they are so laid.
Extracted from the Legislative Department’s May 2026 edition. Page footnotes may refer to neighbouring provisions; check their markers in the PDF. Inclusion in this edition does not by itself establish commencement or judicial effect.
