Anuj Agnihotri did not take the obvious path. Most people who get into AIIMS stay in medicine. The degree is too hard to earn, the career too respected to walk away from. Agnihotri walked away anyway.
On March 6, 2026, the UPSC declared its Civil Services results. His name was at the top. All India Rank 1.
Where he comes from
Rawatbhata is not a name most people outside Rajasthan would recognise. It is a small town, best known locally for its nuclear power plant. Agnihotri grew up there, went to Atomic Energy Central School for his tenth standard, then moved to Kota for his twelfth, the city that has become synonymous with competitive exam pressure in India.
From Kota, he made it to AIIMS Jodhpur. That alone is an achievement most students spend years chasing. He graduated with his MBBS in 2023. Then he turned around and started preparing for UPSC.
Third attempt. First Rank.
This was not his first shot at it. Agnihotri cleared the exam on his third attempt, a detail that will matter to the lakhs of aspirants sitting with their books right now, wondering if they should keep going.
He was already working in the Delhi, Andaman and Nicobar Islands Civil Service and was in the middle of probation training when he appeared for this attempt. He was not starting from scratch. He was building on what he already had.
He was also a student of the Vajiram and Ravi Interview Guidance Program, which shaped how he prepared for the personality test, the stage where many candidates with strong written scores still fall short.
The kind of candidate panels remember
A mock interview recording from his preparation period has been making the rounds and it shows something interesting. Agnihotri did not try to bluff his way through questions he could not answer. When a panel member asked him about something he was not sure of, he said simply, I will read into it, sir.
That kind of honesty is rarer than it sounds in interview rooms where candidates are conditioned to always have an answer ready.
He spoke about civic sense and sanitation in smaller towns. He talked about the Aravalli Range and why weakening its environmental protections could damage large parts of northern India. He argued against mandatory HIV testing before marriage, saying personal autonomy matters as much as public health goals. He spoke about nuclear energy, unsurprising given where he grew up, calling it a reliable, low-emission part of India’s energy future.
On every topic, he had a view. On the ones he did not know well enough, he said so. The panel noticed.
Why did he leave medicine
He has spoken about wanting to work directly with people, not in a clinical setting, but in governance. The reason he chose DANICS over some other Group A services was exactly this. It put him closer to citizens and real administrative challenges rather than behind a desk pushing files.
For someone who spent years training to heal people one at a time, the shift makes a certain kind of sense. Same instinct. Bigger scale.
What comes next
AIR 1 in UPSC almost certainly means the IAS. The training follows. Then a posting. Then years of work in districts and departments and eventually, if the career goes the way these careers can go, something much larger.
Agnihotri is from Chittorgarh district in Rajasthan. A state that has produced UPSC toppers before but never stops celebrating when it produces another one. His hometown is proud today in the way that small Indian towns get proud, loudly, completely and with the kind of feeling that stays in the air for weeks.
He credited luck for his success when asked about it.
The third attempt, the AIIMS degree left behind, the years of preparation while already working, that was not luck. That was just a man who decided what he wanted and did not stop until he got there.
