Indian Statistical Service
| Service Overview | |||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Abbreviation | ISS | ||||||||||
| Formed | 1961 | ||||||||||
| Country |  | ||||||||||
| Civil Service academy | National Statistical System Training Academy (NSSTA), Greater Noida | ||||||||||
| Controlling authority | Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation | ||||||||||
| Legal personality | Governmental: Government service | ||||||||||
| General nature | Statistical Planning
Policy Formulation Policy Implementation | ||||||||||
| Preceding service | Null | ||||||||||
| Cadre Size | 814 (2017) | ||||||||||
| Service Chief | |||||||||||
| Chief Statistician of India (Secretary to Govt. of India) Current: Shri Pravin Srivastava (ISS;1983) | |||||||||||
| Head of the Civil Services | |||||||||||
| Cabinet Secretary Current: Pradeep Kumar Sinha | |||||||||||
The Indian Statistical Service (abbreviated as ISS) (Hindi: भारतीय सांख्यिकी सेवा) is an organized Group-A Central Civil Services of the executive branch of the Government of India.
History
A committee under the chairmanship of Shri V.T.Krishnamachari, the then Deputy Chairman of erstwhile Planning Commission was constituted for examining the matter of establishing statistical cadres after the cabinet decision of 26 July 1952. The Committee submitted its report in September 1953 and recommended formation of ‘Statistical and Economic Advisory Service’. However, Professor Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis, the then Honorary Statistical Adviser to the Cabinet did not favor the idea of a combined Statistical and Economic Advisory Service and suggested an alternative scheme for creation of a Central Statistical Pool. After deliberating on various contradictory views, the Cabinet on 12 February 1958 decided that two separate services namely Statistical Service and Economic Service should be formed. This decision paved the way for formation of ISS and finally the service was constituted in 1961 as a cadre of qualified professional with core discipline of Statistics.
The Indian Statistical Service along with Indian Economic Service (IES) was constituted as a Group-A Central Service on 1 November 1961 by a Gazette notification. All statistical posts of different ministries and departments were pooled together in the initial constitution of service. Direct recruitment in the Service was initiated in 1967 through an examination organized by Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) and the first batch joined in October 1968. The objective of creation of the service was institutionalizing a core professional capacity within the Government to consolidate and disseminate the statistics at national and international level and render crucial statistical needs of planning, policy formulation and decision making.
Cadre strength
The Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MoSPI) is the Cadre Controlling Authority (CCA) for the ISS officers. The CCA is responsible for policy decision related to service matters and the management of the service on the basis of the service rules notified time to time.
At the entry grade of ISS i.e. Junior Time Scale, 50% of the posts are filled through direct recruitment and remaining 50% by promotion of officers from Subordinate Statistical Service (SSS). The direct recruitment is made on the basis of an All India open competitive examination called the ISS/IES Examination conducted by UPSC. The National Statistical System Training Academy (NSSTA), Greater Noida (UP) is the training academy for the ISS officers. The direct recruits undergo a two-years comprehensive probationary training comprising the foundation course, training on survey methodology, micro & macro economics and econometrics at the Indian Statistical Institutes, training on various modules at several national institutes of repute across the country, attachment with different Ministries, National Sample Survey Office (NSSO) and State Directorate of Economics and Statistics (DES) etc.
The Cadre strength of ISS is periodically reviewed by the ISS Board chaired by the Cabinet Secretary and the final Cadre strength is approved by the Cabinet. The latest Cadre Review was approved by the Cabinet on 29 July 2015 and the ISS rules 2016 were notified on 7 June 2016. At present, the cadre strength of the service is 814 and distributed in various grades as under:
| Sl. No. | Grade / Designation | Pay Structure | Sanctioned Strength |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | HAG Plus (Director General) | Level -16 | 5 |
| 2 | HAG (Additional Director General) | Level -15 | 18 |
| 3 | SAG (Deputy Director General) | Level -14 | 136 |
| 4 | JAG/NFSG (Joint Director/Director) | Level-12 & 13 | 176 |
| 5 | STS (Deputy Director) | Level -11 | 179 |
| 6 | JTS (Assistant Director) | Level-10 | 300 |
Role of ISS Officers
The ISS officers play a diversified role in the statistical thinking of the Government and they contribute significantly in national and international organizations in terms of ensuring statistical administration; statistical planning & advice; formulation, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of development policy and programmes etc.
Most of the Ministries and Departments have Statistical Units or Divisions to deal with statistics related to their department. Some of the ministries, like Agriculture, Water Resources, Health, Commerce, Labour etc. have full-fledged statistical divisions, while most others have only a nucleus cell. Each Ministry/Department are expected to maintain relevant databases and also undertake monitoring and evaluation of all the concerned projects and programmes. The ISS officers are involved in compilation of different kind of statistics and formulation/monitoring/evaluation of different schemes in these Ministries/Departments and are under the administrative control of the concerned Ministries.
The cadre posts of the ISS are spread across 40 different Ministries of the Central Government. Besides manning Cadre posts, the ISS officers go on deputation to serve in various domestic and international organizations such as Central Staffing Scheme, UN bodies, foreign governments, state governments, PSUs etc.
The major statistical engagement of ISS officers include compilation of estimates/indicators related to Gross Domestic Product (GDP), National Income, Inflation based on Consumer Price Index (CPIs), Index of Industrial Production (IIP), Annual Survey of Industry (ASI), Economic Census, Agriculture Census, Livestock Census, NSS reports on Socio-economic survey, monitoring of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), monitoring of Central Sector Infrastructure projects, policy formulation for Members of Parliament Local Area Development Scheme (MPLADS) etc.