Valentine’s Day: How UPSC CSE 2018 Topper IAS Srushti Deshmukh Met Husband IAS Nagarjun Gowda – News18

IAS Srushti Deshmukh passed the UPSC civil service exam on her first attempt in the year 2018. She had secured 5th rank in the exam and had become the topper among women candidates that year. Deshmukh started preparing for the UPSC exam while studying engineering. A native of Bhopal, it was during her civil service training in Mussoorie that she met her future husband IAS Dr Nagarjun B Gowda, who hails from Karnataka.

The two met during training at the Civil Service Training Academy LBSNAA or Lal Bahadur Shastri Training Academy. Both of them dated each other for about two and a half years. After getting engaged on August 2, 2021, they got married on April 24, 2022. After their training session, Deshmukh was allotted MP cadre while Gowda B Gowda got Karnataka cadre. After marriage, Gowda was transferred to Madhya Pradesh.

Srishti had secured 895 marks in the UPSC Mains exam and 173 marks in the interview, totaling 1068. Her father Jayant Deshmukh is an engineer in a private company and her mother Sunita Deshmukh works as a teacher in a private school. She has studied at Carmel Convent School in Bhopal and secured a 10 CGPA in Class 10 and 93 per cent marks in Class 12. After this, Srushti obtained an engineering degree and along with that, she also started preparing for the civil service exam. Apart from being an IAS officer, she is also a writer and has written a book for UPSC aspirants as well.

Meanwhile, after completing schooling, IAS Nagarjuna Gowda studied MBBS before becoming an IAS. While he aspired to be a doctor initially, it was during his tenure as a resident in a hospital that he embarked on his UPSC IAS exam preparation journey. He secured a 418th rank in the UPSC exam in 2018.