What is RBI Grade B?

RBI Grade B is one of the most sought-after jobs in India’s banking sector. Through RBI Grade B Exam, selected candidates are recruited to the post of Officer in Reserve Bank of India. With an attractive pay scale and reputed job profile, every year thousands of students take the RBI Grade B exam. It is very important to plan for this review effectively with a few vacancies. Every year, Reserve Bank of India (RBI) releases the notification for application form of Grade B post-Officers General, DEPR and DSIM on its official website.

RBI Grade B Officer Job Description

After the selection of the candidate as RBI Grade B officer, a probation period of two years along with 15 weeks of training is kept. This probations period can be extended to 4 years. The venue of this training is the Reserve Bank Staff College. The job profile of the RBI Grade B officer differs from one post to the other based on the locations candidates have posted. The departments include Financial Markets, Banking Supervision, Banking Regulation, Currency Issuing, Public Debt Office, Foreign Exchange, HRD. We have discussed the job profile of officer of RBI Grade B in a very precise manner below.

• Ensuring Nation’s Financial Stability- The RBI Grade B Officers work towards keeping the inflation under check and ensure adequate supply of liquidity of the production sector is taken care or is under control. It is important to maintain the financial stability of the country and the officers are responsible for the smooth functioning. The officers are entitled with enhancing the confidence of the public in the financial system of the country and make them use the cost effective and new technology services provided by the bank to its customers.
• Currency Issue and circulation- As RBI issues coins and currency, RBI Grade B Officers are responsible for its circulation to the various nationalized banks covered under the boundaries of RBI. Also, smooth functioning of the currency till the subordinate units of RBI is also an important duty of the RBI Grade B officer.
• Management of Government accounts- Management of the state and central government accounts by performing various merchant banking functions for them.

If you wish to clear RBI Grade B exam, you must know about RBI Grade B exam latest updates, selection process, eligibility, exam pattern, syllabus, previous year cut off etc before starting RBI Grade B exam preparation. In this article, we have covered all information which is very crucial for your RBI Grade B exam preparation holistically. You are requested to go through this article to get all the relevant information for the RBI Grade B exam.

RBI Grade B Exam Highlights

RBI Grade B Eligibility Criteria

RBI Grade B Qualification

Candidate appearing for the RBI Grade B examination must be a graduate from a recognized university or institute. She/he must have attained 60% marks in the graduation while the same percentage is reduced to 50% for the candidates belonging to the reserved category. Lets discuss detailed RBI Group B qualification criteria below.

• Officers in Grade ‘B’ (DR) – (General): Minimum 60% marks (50% in case of SC/ST/PwBD) or an equivalent grade in Bachelor’s degree as well as in 12th (or Diploma or equivalent) and 10th Standard examinations. Minimum qualifying percentage or an equivalent grade for the Bachelor’s degree will be in aggregate for all semesters / years.
• Officers in Grade ‘B’ (DR) – DEPR: A Master’s Degree in Economics / Econometrics / Quantitative Economics / Mathematical Economics / Integrated Economics Course/ Finance, with a minimum of 55% marks or an equivalent grade in aggregate of all semesters /years from a recognised Indian or Foreign University /Institute;
  OR
  PGDM/ MBA Finance with a minimum of 55% marks or an equivalent grade in aggregate of all semesters /years from a recognised Indian or Foreign University /Institute;
  OR
  Master’s Degree in Economics in any of the sub-categories of economics i.e. agricultural/ business/ developmental/ applied, etc., with a minimum of 55% marks or an equivalent grade in aggregate of all semesters /years from a recognised Indian or Foreign University /Institute.
• Officers in Grade ‘B’ (DR) – DSIM: Master’s Degree in Statistics/ Mathematical Statistics/ Mathematical Economics/ Econometrics/ Statistics & Informatics from IIT-Kharagpur/ Applied Statistics & Informatics from IIT-Bombay with a minimum of 55% marks or equivalent grade (aggregate of all semesters / years)
  OR
  Master’s Degree in Mathematics with a minimum of 55% marks or an equivalent grade in aggregate of all semesters / years and one year post graduate diploma in Statistics or related subjects from a reputed Institute
  OR
  M. Stat. Degree of Indian Statistical Institute with a minimum of 55% marks (aggregate of all semesters / years)
  OR
  Post Graduate Diploma in Business Analytics (PGDBA) jointly offered by ISI Kolkata, IIT Kharagpur and IIM Calcutta with a minimum of 55% marks or equivalent grade in aggregate of all semesters/years.

Note –

• In addition to this, candidates having masters’ degree with 55% marks will be allowed to apply for the RBI Exam.
• Candidates having post graduate diploma in management or Masters of Business administration can also apply for the RBI Officer Grade B exam.
• Chartered Accountant (CA), Company secretary or Cost Accountant & can also apply for this examination.
• Candidates having Doctorate degree with aggregate 50% marks can also apply for the RBI examination.

RBI Grade B Age Criteria

RBI has defined minimum age criteria for appearing in the RBI Officer (Grade ‘B’) examination. Candidates are required to be aged between 21 years and 30 years (both age included) to apply for RBI Grade B exam.

Candidates, who belong to the reserved category, will be provided relaxation in their upper age as per the rules decided by the Board.

Selection Process & RBI Grade B Exam Pattern

RBI Grade B preparation is incomplete without the knowledge of RBI Grade B Exam Pattern. Hence, you needs to know all the aspects under the exam, one of which is exam pattern. RBI Grade B selection Process of the exam is conducted in three different steps:

RBI Grade B Exam Pattern: Phase I (Prelims)

• The Prelims Exam of RBI Grade B will comprise of 4 sections namely English Language, Reasoning, General Awareness & Quantitative Aptitude.
• The entire section needs to be completed in a time span of 120 minutes or 2 hours.
• The Questions asked will be bilingual (asked in both English & Hindi) except for English Language Section.
• A total of 200 questions will be asked which will carry 1 marks each. Thus, the total score of the entire Phase-I Exam will be around 200 Marks.
• There is also Negative Marking for the first round of the selection process of RBI Grade B exam.
• 0.25 marks will be deducted for every question attempted wrong.
• There will be no deduction in marks if candidates leave any question unanswered or unattended.

RBI Grade B Exam Pattern: Phase II (Mains)

• Candidates who successfully qualify the Preliminary Round will be eligible for RBI Grade B Phase II Exam.
• The Phase II Exam will three papers will be conducted namely Economic & Social Sciences, English, Finance & Management.
• The Phase-II Exam will constitute of Both Subjective & Objective Type of questions.
• Except the English Section, all the questions asked will be bilingual (available in both English & Hindi).
• Individually all the sections need to be completed in 1 hour 30 minutes or 90 minutes each.
• Marks allotted for each paper is around 100.
• Thus the cumulative score of the entire Mains Exam is 300 marks.
• Just like Prelims Exam, there will be negative marking in this phase of examination as well.
• 0.25 marks will be deducted for every question attempted wrong against 1 mark awarded to candidates for attempting a question right.
• No marks will be deducted for leaving a question blank (unattended).

RBI Grade B Exam Pattern: Interview Process

Interview Process is the final stage of RBI Grade B selection Process. If you successfully clear the Mains Round, then you are called for the Interview Process. Interview round has 50 marks. Final merit list is formulated after the conclusion of the RBI interview round.

You can choose either Hindi or English language for the interview round. If you are selected, then your  roll number will be uploaded on the official website. Invitation Letter will be sent on the email ID of the selected candidates.
The Board considers the following factors to prepare the final merit list:

• Number of Vacancies
• Number of Candidates qualified

Candidates are required to keep visiting this website to know the change in exam pattern, if any. Candidates are requested to check RBI Grade B Syllabus also.

RBI Grade B Exam Syllabus

The major sections from which the questions are asked are Reasoning, Quantitative Aptitude, General Awareness and English Language. As RBI Grade B exam has both Phase-I exam as well as Phase-II exam, the syllabus of both the levels are entirely different from each other.

RBI Grade B Syllabus: Phase I (Prelims)

RBI Grade B Syllabus: Phase II (Mains)

The RBI Grade B Syllabus for Phase I of three sections is given in the table below. The three sections are:

Besides from the above mentioned three sections in Mains Exam, an additional section of English (Written Skills) is also present through which a candidate is tested for his/her writing skills.

RBI Grade B Application Process & Fee

Follow the given steps for RBI Grade B Online Application form:

• Login with your Registration Number and Password.
• Fill up all the necessary details – personal, educational, choice of exam center and correspondence details
• Upload the scanned images of the Photo and Signature. Also upload the Hand Written Declaration, which must be written by the candidate in the same way as written above
• Verify your details and check all the entered information for its correctness.
• Now click on the “Final Submit” button.
• Click on the “Payment” tab to make the payment of RBI Officer Grade B application fee.
• Click on the “Submit” button and save a copy of your RBI Grade B online application form.

RBI Grade B Online Application Fee for all category candidates is tabulated below:

RBI Grade B Admit Card

You are required to download RBI Grade B Admit Card from the official website of Reserve Bank of India as the hard copy of the admit card won’t be sent to the applicants via post. You must login to their account and download the admit card from the official website of RBI.

• Step 1: Check the official website @rbi.org.in
• Step 2: Enter the Application Number and Password
• Step 3: Click on Login
• Step 4: Check the details displayed
• Step 5: Download your RBI Admit Card a print out for future use

RBI Grade B Salary Structure

The starting salary of RBI Grade B Salary in hand will be around Rs 35,150/-.

The RBI Grade B Salary is tabulated below:

RBI Grade B Allowances

• Dearness Allowance (DA): DA of 113% of the basic salary.
• HRA Allowance: 2BHK/3BHK flat is given to the RBI Grade B employees. If the employees are not allocated with flats, then they can claim up to Rs 70,000 as rent allowance.
• Medical Allowance: Medical allowances up to 4000 Rupees can be claimed. These allowances are also valid for the dependents of the employees.
• Education Allowance Grade B officer can avail Rs. 4000/- under education allowance every month.
• Fuel Allowance:150 litters of fuel per month can be claimed.
• Maid Allowance: Rs 3000/- is offered under the maid allowance is received by RBI Grade B officers.
• Mobile Allowance: A claim up to Rs 1500/- as mobile allowance.
• Sodexo Coupons: RBI provides the employees with Sodexo coupons worth Rs 2000/- which can be spent on food/groceries.
• Leave Fare Concession Travel (LFC): The RBI will offer around Rs100000 for the employees under LFC allowance. This can be availed once in two years, by the employee and his dependents.
• Briefcase allowance: The officers can avail Rs.7000 under briefcase allowance. This amount can be reimbursed once in every three years.
• Spectacles allowances: Spectacles allowance of Rs 7000/- can be claimed for either the RBI Grade B officer or the spouse.

RBI Grade B Salary Increments

All the Officers selected through RBI Grade B 2019 Exam receives  an annual salary range of 12-14 Lac. Along with the CTC, various emoluments & allowances are given. The Pay Scale for the RBI grade B Officer is Rs. 35150-1750(9)-50900-EB-1750(2)-54400-2000(4)-62400.
This can further explained as follows:

• Initial Basic Pay – Rs 35150 with a yearly increment of Rs 1750 for 9 years
• Rs 50900 and yearly increment of Rs 1750 for the next two years in the executive band
• Rs 54400 and yearly increment of Rs 2000 for the next four years
• Rs 62400 (Maximum Basic Pay)

Thus, the RBI Grade B Salary is Rs. 62,400/- (Maximum) and this is when an employee does not take any promotion.

RBI Grade B Promotion

With a constant increase in the salary of RBI Grade B Officers, the promotion designations also attract the candidates. The candidates employed as RBI Grade B Officers get promoted in the following series:

1. Assistant Manager
2. Manager
3. Assistant General Manager
4. Deputy General Manager
5. General Manager
6. Chief General Manager
7. Principal Chief General Manager
8. Executive Director
9. Deputy Governor
10. Governor