India
IIT Bombay Graduate Kanishak Kataria Wins UPSC Rank 1 After Leaving ₹1 Cr South Korean Job
Kanishak Kataria, a BTech Computer Science graduate from IIT Bombay, left a ₹1 crore annual package in South Korea to return to India and prepare for the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) Civil Services Examination. After 18 months as a software engineer at Samsung Electronics in South Korea, he moved to Bengaluru, where he worked as a data scientist for a technology solutions company before quitting in 2017 to focus on the exam.
In 2018, Kataria secured All‑India Rank 1 in the UPSC exam. The Union Public Service Commission announced him as the topper on 5 April 2019. In a speech to ANI, he thanked his parents, sister and girlfriend for their support, noting that people would expect him to be a good administrator and that was his intention.
Kataria said that while earning a high salary abroad, he realized that money was not his sole motivation and that he sought "sustainable happiness" through work that could help people. After returning to India, his earnings fell to about a third of his previous package.
He joined the Rajasthan cadre as an IAS officer of the 2019 batch and is currently serving as the Commissioner of the Bharatpur Development Authority.
The story has attracted attention not only for his achievement but also for his public acknowledgment of his girlfriend in his success speech, an uncommon gesture among UPSC toppers.