Rajeshwari Suve M | AIR 2, UPSC CSE 2025

IPS Officer-Elect | UPSC Civil Services Examination 2025 – AIR 2 | Female Topper

Rajeshwari Suve M
Born	3 May 1997 (age 28)
Origin	Vadipatti, Madurai district, Tamil Nadu, India
Education	B.E. in Electrical and Electronics Engineering
Alma mater	Vel Tech Multi Tech Engineering College, Anna University, Chennai (2018)
Occupation	Civil Servant; formerly Deputy Collector (Training), Dindigul
UPSC RANK	AIR 2, UPSC Civil Services Examination 2025; Female Topper
Service (selected)	Indian Police Service (IPS) (preferred)
Optional subject	Sociology
Roll number	4000040
Category	General
Attempts	5th attempt (UPSC CSE); also appeared for IFoS
Father	Self-employed businessman
Mother	Associate Professor, government institution

Rajeshwari Suve M is an Indian civil servant from Vadipatti in the Madurai district of Tamil Nadu. She secured All India Rank 2 (AIR 2) in the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) Civil Services Examination 2025, the results of which were declared on 6 March 2026. She is the female topper of UPSC CSE 2025 – the highest-ranked woman in the examination cycle – placing second overall in a merit list of 958 recommended candidates out of hundreds of thousands who appeared. At the time of her result, she was serving as a Deputy Collector (Training) in Dindigul under the Tamil Nadu government, having previously cleared the Tamil Nadu Public Service Commission (TNPSC) Group 1 Examination. Her journey from an engineering graduate in Madurai to India’s second-highest-ranked civil services officer of 2025 – achieved in her fifth attempt over seven years of preparation – has made her one of the most widely discussed UPSC success stories of the year.

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Early Life and Family

Rajeshwari Suve M was born on 3 May 1997 in Vadipatti, a town in the Madurai district of Tamil Nadu. She grew up in a family that placed strong emphasis on education and discipline. Her father is a self-employed businessman, and her mother is an Associate Professor in a government institution – an academic household environment that is widely credited with nurturing her intellectual curiosity and early interest in public service. From an early age, Rajeshwari was noted for her academic brightness and personal determination, qualities that would later define her long journey toward the civil services.

Education

Rajeshwari completed her Class 10 and Class 12 education under the Tamil Nadu State Board. After school, she pursued a Bachelor of Engineering (B.E.) in Electrical and Electronics Engineering from Vel Tech Multi Tech Engineering College, affiliated with Anna University, Chennai. She graduated in 2018. Her engineering degree, while in a technical discipline distant from the humanities-oriented civil services curriculum, is credited with developing strong analytical and problem-solving skills that proved useful in tackling the multi-disciplinary UPSC examination.

Following her graduation, she identified civil services as her career goal and pivoted her preparation accordingly, supplementing her technical foundation with extensive reading in history, polity, economics, and sociology.

Career Before UPSC Success

Indian Forest Service Examination

In the years following her engineering graduation, Rajeshwari appeared for the Indian Forest Service (IFoS) Examination, gaining valuable competitive examination experience and exposure to the interview process. Although she did not ultimately pursue that service, the attempt sharpened her exam-taking strategies and deepened her understanding of UPSC’s evaluation standards.

Tamil Nadu Public Service Commission (TNPSC)

Alongside her UPSC preparation, Rajeshwari also prepared for the Tamil Nadu Public Service Commission Group 1 Examination. She cleared the TNPSC Group 1 exam and was appointed as a Deputy Collector (Training) in Dindigul, Tamil Nadu – a significant achievement in its own right. This posting gave her ground-level exposure to governance, district administration, policy implementation, and public interaction, which directly enriched the quality and depth of her answers in the UPSC Mains examination – particularly in General Studies Paper II (Governance and Polity) and in Essay paper responses. She was serving in this capacity at the time the UPSC CSE 2025 results were declared.

UPSC Civil Services Examination

Overview of Attempts

Rajeshwari appeared for the UPSC Civil Services Preliminary Examination five times before achieving her final breakthrough. Each attempt contributed to a progressive refinement of her strategy. Her first attempts helped her understand the breadth and depth of the syllabus; later attempts saw her shift focus toward answer writing quality, time management in the examination hall, and the precision required to score highly in the personality test (interview).

Preparation Strategy

Rajeshwari’s preparation is characterised by consistency, strategic subject selection, and a disciplined integration of her professional experience into her academic preparation.

For her optional subject, she chose Sociology – a decision widely considered one of the most strategic elements of her preparation. Sociology’s alignment with General Studies themes such as social justice, governance, marginalised communities, and public policy meant that her optional preparation reinforced her GS answer writing rather than requiring entirely separate effort. She studied foundational sociological thinkers including Emile Durkheim, Max Weber, Karl Marx, and Talcott Parsons at depth, building conceptual clarity that allowed her to write structured, thinker-anchored answers in both the optional and GS papers.

Her preparation for General Studies was anchored in standard NCERT textbooks and foundational reference books, with consistent engagement with current affairs journals and newspapers. Like many high-performing UPSC candidates, she emphasised depth over breadth – thorough revision of a curated set of sources rather than broad reading across many materials.

Her practical experience as a Deputy Collector provided her with real-world administrative insights that are difficult to replicate in purely academic preparation. Encounters with governance challenges, district-level policy implementation, and citizen interface directly informed the quality of her Mains answers and gave her substantive material for her personality test responses.

Final Result – UPSC CSE 2025

The Union Public Service Commission declared the final results of the Civil Services Examination 2025 on 6 March 2026. Rajeshwari Suve M appeared under Roll Number 4000040 in the General category and secured All India Rank 2 on a merit list of 958 recommended candidates – the second-highest rank in a field drawn from one of the world’s most competitive examinations. She was the female topper of the examination cycle, the highest-ranked woman in UPSC CSE 2025.

The overall UPSC CSE 2025 topper was Anuj Agnihotri (AIR 1) from Rawatbhata, Rajasthan. Rajeshwari was followed by Akansh Dhull (AIR 3), Raghav Jhunjhunwala (AIR 4), and Ishan Bhatnagar (AIR 5) in the overall merit list.

Preferred Service: Indian Police Service

In a notable expression of personal conviction, Rajeshwari stated publicly that despite securing a rank well within the Indian Administrative Service (IAS) allocation bracket, her preferred service was the Indian Police Service (IPS) – driven by a lifelong aspiration to serve the country in uniform. This declaration drew considerable attention and admiration, as the IPS is perceived by many aspirants as a distinctly demanding service, and the choice to pursue it over the IAS by a top-two ranker was seen as a statement of principled purpose rather than institutional prestige-seeking.

Reception and Significance

The announcement of Rajeshwari Suve M’s AIR 2 result generated widespread celebration in Vadipatti and across the Madurai district. Her achievement was reported prominently in Tamil-language and national media, with particular attention given to the arc of her journey – from an engineering graduate who initially set out without a guaranteed pathway, through multiple attempts, a professional career in state administration, and finally a top-two national rank.

She is regarded as an inspiration for UPSC aspirants across Tamil Nadu and India more broadly, particularly for women candidates who aspire to the civil services. Her success demonstrates several widely applicable lessons: the value of a long-term, multi-attempt approach to UPSC; the strategic selection of an optional subject that overlaps with General Studies; and the advantage of practical governance experience in enriching Mains answers and interview performance.

Among Tamil Nadu’s UPSC achievers, her AIR 2 is one of the highest ranks secured in recent years, and she has been celebrated by educational institutions, civil society groups, and political leaders across the state.

Personal Life

Rajeshwari Suve M is from Vadipatti, Madurai district, Tamil Nadu. She was 28 years old at the time of her UPSC CSE 2025 result. She belongs to the General category. Beyond her professional and examination journey, she is described by those who know her as deeply mission-oriented – driven by a clear sense of purpose around public service and a desire to contribute meaningfully to governance in India.