What is the selection process for PFRDA Grade A (Assistant Manager)?

The selection process includes three phases: Phase I: Preliminary Online Exam Phase II: Mains Online Exam Phase III: Interview Candidates must clear each phase to qualify for the next stage.

How many papers are there in PFRDA Grade A Phase I exam?

Phase I consists of two papers: Paper I: General Aptitude (English, Reasoning, Quantitative Aptitude, and General Awareness) Paper II: Professional Knowledge (based on stream)

Is there negative marking in the PFRDA Grade A Exam?

Yes, 1/4th mark is deducted for each incorrect answer in both Paper I and Paper II of Phase I and Phase II.

What is the structure of the PFRDA Phase II Exam?

Phase II has: Paper 1: Descriptive English Test (Essay, Precis & Letter Writing) – 100 marks and Paper 2: Stream-specific Professional Knowledge – 50 MCQs, 100 marks

Is the exam bilingual?

Ans: Yes, all question papers (except the English Descriptive Test) will be available in both Hindi and English.

Where can I download the official PFRDA Grade A Syllabus PDF?

You can download the complete PFRDA Grade A Syllabus 2026 PDF from the official website www.pfrda.org.in or through the direct link provided in the syllabus article.

PFRDA Grade A Syllabus 2026, Exam Pattern Revised (Prelims and Mains), Download PDF

Table of Contents

The PFRDA Assistant Manager Syllabus is divided into three stages: Phase I (Prelims), Phase II (Mains), and the Interview. Phase I covers English Language, Quantitative Aptitude, Reasoning Ability, General Awareness, and Professional Knowledge. Phase II includes Descriptive English and an Objective Professional Knowledge test. The detailed stream-wise syllabus for all stages is given below to help candidates understand the topics and plan their preparation effectively.

As per the official Notification for PFRDA Grade A, the Exam Pattern for Phase 1 and Phase 2 has been slightly revised. Candidates are advised to check it carefully.

PFRDA Grade A Syllabus 2026

Candidates should prepare according to the requirements of each phase of the PFRDA Assistant Manager exam. While the common subjects are covered in Phase I, the Professional Knowledge syllabus differs for General, Legal, Research, IT, and Actuarial streams.

Candidates must therefore focus on the topics applicable to their selected stream. Along with building conceptual understanding, they should practise objective questions for Phase I and develop strong descriptive writing skills for Phase II.

Particulars	Details
Exam Name	PFRDA Grade A 2026
Conducting Body	Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA)
Selection Process	Phase I (Prelims), Phase II (Mains), and Interview
Phase I Duration	Paper I: 60 minutes Paper II: 40 minutes
Phase II Duration	Paper I: 60 minutes Paper II: 40 minutes
Negative Marking	¼ mark deducted for each wrong answer in Phase I and Phase II
Professional Streams	General, Information Technology, Research (Economics), Research (Statistics), Legal, Finance & Accounts, and Official Language (Rajbhasha)
Language of Exam	Hindi and English

PFRDA Grade A Exam Pattern 2026 (Latest)

Candidates can understand the number of papers, subjects, questions, marks, and duration of the examination by referring to the PFRDA Assistant Manager Exam Pattern. Both Phase I and Phase II consist of two papers, where Paper 1 covers general aptitude and Paper 2 tests Professional Knowledge based on the candidate’s selected stream. The complete phase-wise structure is provided below to help candidates understand the examination format.

PFRDA Grade A Phase I Exam Pattern

The selection process begins with the Phase I online examination, consisting of two papers carrying 100 marks each. Candidates can check the sections included in the Phase I examination below for a clear understanding of the paper structure.

Negative Marking: ¼ mark will be deducted for each wrong answer in Phase I (Paper 1 & 2).

PFRDA Assistant Manager Exam Pattern for Phase 1 (Revised)
Paper	Sections	No. of Questions	Marks	Duration
Paper I (All Streams)	English Language	20	25	60 Minutes
	Quantitative Aptitude	20	25
	Reasoning	30	25
	General Awareness	20	25
	Total	90	100
Paper II	General Stream: Multiple-choice questions on subjects: Commerce, Accountancy, Management, Finance, Costing, Companies Act, Economics and Pension Sector.	50	100	40 Minutes
Paper II	Information Technology, Finance and Accounts, Research (Economics), Research (Statistics), Legal and Official Language (Rajbhasha) Streams: Multiple choice questions on specialised subjects related to stream.	50	100	40 Minutes

Note: Candidates would need to secure separate cut-offs in each paper as well as an aggregate cut-off.

PFRDA Grade A Phase II Exam Pattern

The Phase 2 exam pattern for the PFRDA Assistant Manager Exam has been discussed here for the candidates. A ¼ mark will be deducted for wrong answers in Paper II.

PFRDA Assistant Manager Exam Pattern for Phase 2 (Revised)
Paper	Streams/Subject	Maximum Marks	No. of Questions	Duration	Weightage
Paper 1	All Streams: English (Descriptive Test) to test drafting skills	100	3	60 minutes	1/3rd
Paper 2	General Stream: MCQs on Commerce, Accountancy, Management, Finance, Costing, Companies Act, Economics, and Pension Sector, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Media, Marketing & Communication (newly added)	100	50	40 minutes	2/3rd
Paper 2	IT, Finance & Accounts, Research (Economics/Statistics), Legal, and Official Language (Rajbhasha) Streams: Multiple-choice questions on specialised subjects related to the stream	100	50	40 minutes	2/3rd

Note: All question papers (in both Phase I & Phase II, except the Test of English) will be set bilingually in Hindi and English.

PFRDA Grade A Syllabus

The detailed PFRDA Syllabus for each subject is provided in the table below. Candidates are advised to review all the topics carefully and plan a structured study schedule to ensure thorough preparation before the exam.

Subjects	Topics
English Language	Reading Comprehension Cloze Test Vocabulary Sentence Rearrangement Phrase replacement Error Detection Fill in the blanks Sentence improvement
Quantitative Aptitude	Bar Graph, Line Chart, Tabular, Caselet, Radar/Web, Pie Chart Inequalitie,(Quadratic Equations), Number Series, Approximation and Simplification, Data Sufficiency, HCF and LCM, Profit and Loss, SI & CI, Problem on Ages, Work and Time, Speed, Distance and Time, Probability, Mensuration, Permutations and Combinations, Pipes and Cisterns Averages, Ratios and Proportions, Problems on Boats and Stream, Partnership Problems on Trains, Mixture and Alligation
Reasoning Ability	Syllogism Input-Output Puzzle Seating Arrangement Coding & Decoding Blood Relation Direction and Distance Inequality
General Awareness	Questions related to the Finance Sector Summits & Conferences Indexes Pension Scheme Banking & Financial Awareness Indian Economy & Budget Government Scheme & Policies Awards Current Affairs

PFRDA Grade A Syllabus for Professional Knowledge

The PFRDA Grade A Syllabus is structured according to the stream chosen by the candidate. The major streams include General, Legal, Finance & Accounts, IT, Research (Economics), and Official Language (Rajbhasha).

While the General stream covers areas such as Economics, Finance, Commerce, Management, Cost Accounting, and the Pension Sector, other streams focus on specialised topics related to their respective fields, including legal provisions, financial regulations, and information technology.

1. General Stream (For Both Phases)

Stream	Syllabus Topics
Commerce & Accountancy	Accounting Standards with specific reference to Accounting for Depreciation, Inventories, Revenue Recognition, Fixed Assets, Foreign Exchange Transactions, Investments.
	Accounting as a financial information system;
	Cash Flow Statement, Fund flow statement, Financial statement analysis, Ratio analysis;
	Accounting for Share Capital Transactions including Bonus Shares, Right Shares.
	Employee Stock Option and Buy-Back of Securities.
	Preparation and Presentation of Company Final Accounts.
Management	Management: its nature and scope; The Management Processes; Planning, Organisation, Staffing, Directing and Controlling;
	The Role of a Manager in an Organisation. Leadership: The Tasks of a Leader;
	Leadership Styles; Leadership Theories; A successful Leader versus an effective Leader.
	Human Resource Development: Concept of HRD; Goals of HRD;
	Motivation, Morale and Incentives: Theories of Motivation; How Managers Motivate; Concept of Morale; Factors determining morale; Role of Incentives in Building up Morale.
	Communication: Steps in the Communication Process; Communication Channels; Oral versus Written Communication; Verbal versus non-verbal Communication; upward, downward and lateral communication; Barriers to Communication, Role of Information Technology.
Finance	Financial System
	Role and Functions of Regulatory bodies in the Financial Sector.
	Financial Markets
	Primary and Secondary Markets (Forex, Money, Bond, Equity, etc.), functions, instruments, recent developments.
	General Topics
	Basics of Derivatives: Forward, Futures and Swap
	Recent Developments in the Financial Sector
	Financial Inclusion- use of technology
	Alternate source of finance, private and social cost-benefit, Public-Private Partnership
	Direct and Indirect taxes; Non-tax sources of Revenue, GST, Finance Commission, Fiscal Policy, Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management Act (FRBM),
	Inflation: Definition, trends, estimates, consequences, and remedies (control): WPI, CPI-components and trends.
Costing	Overview of Cost and Management Accounting – Introduction to Cost and Management Accounting, Objectives and Scope of Cost and Management Accounting.
	Methods of Costing – Single Output/ Unit Costing, Job Costing, Batch Costing, Contract Costing, Process/Operation Costing, Costing of Service Sectors.
	Basics of Cost Control and Analysis – (i) Standard Costing, (ii) Marginal Costing, (iii) Budget and Budgetary Control.
	Lean System and Innovation:-
	Introduction to Lean System
	Just-in-Time (JIT)
	Kaizen Costing
	Total Productive Maintenance (TPM)
	5Ss
	Cellular Manufacturing/ One-Piece Flow Production Systems
	Six Sigma (SS)
	Introduction to Process Innovation and Business Process Re-engineering (BPR).
Companies Act	The Companies Act, 2013 – Specific reference to Chapter III, Chapter IV, Chapter VIII, Chapter X, Chapter XI, Chapter XII and Chapter XXVII.
Economics	Demand and Supply, Market Structures, National Income: Concepts and Measurement, Classical & Keynesian Approach, Determination of output and employment, Consumption Function, Investment Function, Multiplier and Accelerator, Demand and Supply for Money, IS – LM, Inflation and Phillips Curve, Business Cycles
Economics	Balance of Payments, Foreign Exchange Markets, Inflation, Monetary and Fiscal Policy, Non- banking Financial Institutions.
Pension Sector	Status of pension sector in India
	Types of retirement schemes in India and their features
	National Pension System
	Basics of investment
	Annuity Plans
	Atal Pension Yojana

2. Information Technology Stream (For Both Phases)

Topic	Details
Database Concepts	ER model, Relational model: relational algebra, tuple calculus, integrity constraints, normal forms. File organisation, indexing (e.g., B and B+ trees), transactions, and concurrency control.
SQL Queries	Select, view, truncate, delete, update, alter, inner join, different types of outer joins, use of aggregate functions, union, intersection, except, in and exist clauses, nested queries.
Programming Concepts (Java / C C++)	Program control (iteration, recursion, functions), scope of variables, binding of variables & functions, parameter passing, functional and logic programming, OOPS concepts, inheritance, class and object, constructors, functions, exception handling.
Data Analytics Languages (Python / R)	Regex, slicing, data reshaping, dataframes, dictionaries and sets, file management, classes and functions, data mining, lists, importing and exporting data, charts and graphs.
Algorithms for Problem Solving	Tree and graph traversals, connected components, spanning trees, shortest paths; hashing, sorting, searching; design techniques (greedy, dynamic programming, divide-and-conquer).
Networking Concepts	ISO/OSI stack, LAN technologies (Ethernet, token ring), TCP/UDP, IP, basic concepts of switches, gateways, and routers, application layer protocols (DNS, SMTP, POP, FTP, HTTP), firewalls.
Information & Cyber Security Concepts	Cyber attacks, software development security, network security, authentication, CIA – confidentiality, integrity and availability, network audit, systems audit.
Data Warehousing	Data extraction, data cleaning, data transformation, data loading, metadata, data cube, data mart, data models.
Shell Programming	Shell scripting basics, shell variables, shell script arguments, if statement, loop, return, basic UNIX commands.
AI / ML	Machine learning, supervised learning, unsupervised learning, data preprocessing, model evaluation, linear regression, logistic regression, decision trees, clustering, feature engineering, Python for ML, Tensor Flow, PyTorch, scikit-learn, NLP, sentiment analysis, neural networks, overfitting and underfitting, cross-validation, reinforcement learning, cloud AI services, deployment basics.

3. Research (Economics) – (For Both Phases)

Subject	Topics Covered
Economics	Demand and Supply, Market Structures, National Income, Output and Employment Determination, Investment Function, Multiplier and Accelerator, Money Demand and Supply, IS–LM, Inflation and Phillips Curve, Business Cycles, Monetary and Fiscal Policy, Banking Functions, Public Goods, Tax & Non-Tax Revenue, Direct & Indirect Taxes, Fiscal Balance, Public Debt, Public Budget, Foreign Trade, Balance of Payments.
Statistics and Econometrics	Measures of Central Tendency & Dispersion, Correlation, Sampling Methods, Sampling Distribution, Statistical Inferences, Hypothesis Testing, Regression Analysis, Panel Data Analysis, Time Series Properties and Analysis.
Financial Institutions and Markets	Asymmetric Information, Market Model, Market Efficiency, Money, Credit and Capital Markets, Primary and Secondary Markets, Commodity Markets, Mutual Funds, Stock Exchanges, Credit Rating Agencies, Pension and Insurance Markets, Foreign Exchange Markets, Role of International Financial Institutions (IS, IMF & World Bank).

4. Research (Statistics)- (For Both Phases)

Probability Theory,
Descriptive Statistics,
Probability Distributions,
Statistical Inference,
Sampling Techniques,
Testing of Hypothesis,
Economic Statistics,
Time Series Analysis,
Operations Research,
Statistical Quality Control,
Statistical Computing.

5. Legal Stream (For Both Phases)

PFRDA Act, 2013
PMLA, 2002
Constitution of India –Preamble, Part I, Part III, Part IV, Part IVA, Part V, Part VI, Part VIII, Part IXA, Part IXB, Part XI, Part XII, Part XIII, Part XIV, Part XIVA, Part XX,
Law of Contracts –Indian Contract Act, 1872 (Chapters I to VI and VIII to X), Indian Partnership Act, 1932, Specific Relief Act, 1963,
Criminal Law–Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 (Chapters I, II, III, IV, VII, XII, XVII, XIX), Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023
Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023
Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 –Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV, Part V, Part VII, Part VIII (Schedule-I -Order I, II, IV, VII, VIII, X, XI, XVI, XXXIX, XLVII)
Administrative Law and Principles of Natural Justice,
Jurisprudence and Interpretation of Statutes,
Law of Torts and Consumer Protection Act, 2019,
Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 –Part I, Part III, Part IV,
Transfer of Property Act, 1882 –Chapter III, Chapter IV, Chapter V,
Law of Trusts – Principles of trust, Parties to a Trust Deed and Duties of Trustees,
Corporate Law –Companies Act, 2013 (Chapter I, Chapter II, Chapter III, Chapter IV, Chapter V, Chapter VII, Chapter VIII, Chapter IX, Chapter X, Chapter XI, Chapter XII, Chapter XIII, Chapter XV, Chapter XVI, Chapter XXVII, Chapter XXVIII, Chapter XXIX); Limited Liability Partnership Act, 2008; Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 (Part I, Part II),
Taxation –General principles
The Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023
Intellectual Property Rights- Concepts
RTI Act, 2005

6. Finance and Accounting Stream (For Both Phases)

Subject	Syllabus Topics
Finance and Accounts	The Basic Financial Statement
	Trial Balance
	Balance Sheet
	Cash flow statement
	Income Statement
	Analysis of Financial Statement Ratio
	Break-even analysis
	IND AS
	Standard on Auditing
	Cost accounting concepts (basics)
	Marginal costing
	Cost-volume-profit analysis
	Cost sheet
	Forecasting
	Management accounting
	Cost of capital
	Capital structure
	Capital budgeting
	Sources of finance
	Corporate accounting
	Business law – Negotiable instruments Contract act Partnership act Company law (Go through all these laws with amendments)
	Income Tax Act
	GST
	Knowledge of It and Digital Transaction
	Compliance of KYC Norms
	Financial System: Role and Functions of Regulatory bodies in the Financial Sector.
	Financial Markets: Primary and Secondary Markets (Forex, Money, Bond, Equity, etc.), functions, instruments, recent developments.
	General Topics a) Basics of Derivatives: Forward, Futures and Swap b) Recent Developments in the Financial Sector c) Financial Inclusion- use of technology d) Alternate source of finance, private and social cost-benefit, Public-Private Partnership e) Direct and Indirect taxes; Non-tax sources of Revenue, Finance Commission, Fiscal Policy, Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management Act (FRBM), f) Inflation: Definition, trends, estimates, consequences, and remedies (control): WPI, CPI – components and trends. g) Economics: Capital market, Money market, Micro and macro economics concepts and Updates related to money market and RBI policies

7. Official Language Stream (For Both Phases)

Official Language Stream
Official Language Policy	भारत सरकार की राजभाषा नीति (Official Language Policy of the Govt. of India).
Hindi to English Translation	शब्द / वाक्यांश / वाक्य (Terms / Phrases / Sentences).
English to Hindi Translation	शब्द / वाक्यांश / वाक्य (Terms / Phrases / Sentences).
Legal Terminology (Hindi to English)	वर्धिक शब्दावली
Legal Terminology (English to Hindi)	वर्धिक शब्दावली
Administrative & Financial Terminology (Hindi to English)	Administrative / Banking / Capital Market / Economics / Social Security Terminology.
Administrative & Financial Terminology (English to Hindi)	Administrative / Banking / Capital Market / Economics / Social Security Terminology.

PFRDA Grade A Syllabus PDF

The PFRDA Syllabus PDF serves as a complete guide outlining all the subjects and topics to be covered for the Assistant Manager exam. By downloading this PDF, candidates can clearly understand the exam structure, subject-wise coverage, and focus areas for their chosen stream. The direct link to download the syllabus PDF is shared below for easy access.

Important Tips for PFRDA Grade A Exam 2026

Know your stream syllabus well: Professional Knowledge differs by stream (General, Legal, Research, IT, Actuarial), so focus only on topics relevant to your chosen stream
Build a strong base in Quant and Reasoning: These sections are speed-based, so regular practice improves both accuracy and attempt rate
Stay updated with current affairs: General Awareness carries significant weightage; revise daily rather than cramming
Practice descriptive writing for Phase II: Work on essay and letter writing regularly to improve clarity, grammar, and structure within the time limit
Take regular mock tests: Simulate exam conditions to improve time management and identify weak areas
Manage negative marking wisely: avoid guesswork in Phase I and attempt only questions you’re confident about