The Centre has begun ranking all 88 Union ministries and departments on how effectively they are upskilling their workforce under Mission Karmayogi, creating the government's first consolidated scorecard of civil service capacity building as it pushes artificial intelligence (AI)-driven workforce planning across the bureaucracy.
The rankings, reviewed by Mint, underscore a wide divergence in ministries' preparedness under the government's flagship civil service reform programme. The ministry of coal topped the list with a composite score of 50.46, while the ministry of civil aviation ranked last with 0.42, according to two government officials and an 18 June communication issued by Karmayogi Bharat, a government-owned, not-for-profit company established by the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT).
The rankings, based on performance as of 31 May, have been circulated to all ministries and departments and measure how effectively they are building institutional capacity under Mission Karmayogi, the government's civil service upskilling programme.
Wide gap
Among key ministries and offices, the ministry of home affairs ranked seventh (38.56), agriculture and farmers welfare 16th (36.71), the Prime Minister's Office 52nd (10.86), external affairs 58th (9.45), the President's Secretariat 71st (5.70), and the Cabinet Secretariat 79th (3.16). The DoPT ranked eighth with 38.07.
Within the finance ministry, the departments of Expenditure and Revenue ranked sixth and ninth, while DIPAM, Economic Affairs, Public Enterprises and Financial Services placed 44th, 55th, 60th and 73rd, respectively.
“As the Mission continues to mature and expand, the ranking framework and associated indicators will remain dynamic and may be periodically refined to better reflect priority areas of capacity building and learning outcomes,” the Karmayogi Bharat communication said.
Learning push
The rankings are already prompting ministries to examine their performance.
In a 3 July memorandum reviewed by Mint, issued after the 18 June communication, the Department of Telecommunications (DoT), ranked 23rd with a score of 32.64, told its units that completing at least one hour of learning on the iGOT platform carries significant weight in the rankings.
"As per the latest iGOT consumption reports available with the Department, only about 22% of registered officers/officials in DoT completed one hour or more of learning during May 2026, while the corresponding figure for June 2026 is only about 13.5%. This has adversely impacted the overall performance and ranking of the Department under Mission Karmayogi," the memorandum added.
Karmayogi Bharat's chief executive officer Chhavi Bharadwaj, in an emailed response on 9 July, said, "...the data is in the process of being revised," but did not give any more details.
Bharadwaj did not respond to Mint's follow-up queries sent on 10 July.
The department of posts, which ranked 14th, said its geographically dispersed workforce made continuous learning a major undertaking, adding that it had made sustained progress through technology-enabled learning, structured training and competency-based capacity building.
"Building a culture of continuous learning across such a large workforce is a significant undertaking, and the department has made sustained progress by leveraging technology-enabled learning, structured training programmes and competency-based capacity-building initiatives," the department said in response to Mint's queries.
The other top-ranked ministries and departments were environment, forest and climate change (second), mines (third), the Legislative Department (fourth) and the department of defence production (fifth).
Queries emailed on 9 July to all ministries and departments, including the PMO, DoPT and DoT, remained unanswered till press time.
Next phase
The rankings come as the government moves into the next phase of Mission Karmayogi, under which ministries and departments have been directed to prepare AI-generated capacity building plans (CBPs) that map the competencies required for every role and recommend customised learning pathways for officials.
These plans will feed into ministries' annual capacity building plans and officials' annual performance appraisal report for FY2026-27, shifting the focus from uniform training programmes to competency-based workforce planning.
Karmayogi Bharat was set up by the DoPT in 2022 to implement Mission Karmayogi and drive competency-based capacity building for civil servants through the iGOT Karmayogi learning platform.
Governance experts said continuous upskilling is becoming critical as artificial intelligence reshapes public administration.
"If we don't upgrade our skills, we will be left behind, while those who do will move far ahead in the race. It is a very important step, and every official must take it very seriously so that they are not left behind. Otherwise, the competition will overtake them, and they may not be able to deliver what they want to achieve or what is expected of them," said Pravir Krishna, former secretary to government and managing director Tribal Cooperative Marketing Development Federation of India (Trifed).
Sonal Arora, country manager at GI Group Holding, said civil servants, like private-sector professionals, must continually update their knowledge as technology, governance and policy evolve rapidly.