NDA Coaching for Uttarakhand Students (Garhwal & Kumaon)

Uttarakhand has only three UPSC centres for the NDA and CDS written papers, yet the state runs from the plains at Haridwar to the high valleys of Chamoli and the Kumaon hills beyond. A family in one of those hill towns needs three answers: which centre is nearest, how to reach Dehradun, and which school-entry route fits a younger child. This page gives them town by town, using the same sourced facts as our city pages. GS India Defence Academy is at Street 1, Subharti Road, Nanda Ki Chowki, Lower Kolhupani, Dehradun, so the academy is within a day’s journey of every town named below.

The three Uttarakhand exam centres

UPSC’s NDA (II) 2026 notification listed Dehradun, Almora and Srinagar (Uttarakhand) as the state’s centres, and the CDS (II) 2026 notification listed the same three. Haridwar, Roorkee, Haldwani, Nainital and every other town in the state therefore send candidates to one of them, except Rudrapur, whose nearest centre is Bareilly across the border. The table gives the nearest centre for each town in a straight line. Hill roads are longer than a straight line, so leave extra time on the day before the paper.

Centres are allotted in the order of application up to each centre’s capacity, according to UPSC’s notices, so apply early. Our exam calendar tracks the next notification, and the eligibility checker shows which entries a student can sit.

Garhwal: from the hills to Dehradun

The road is the main way down from the Garhwal hills. Our timetable source lists no train service for Uttarkashi, New Tehri, Srinagar, Pauri or Gopeshwar, and none from Kotdwar to Dehradun or Haridwar, so the table below gives the road distance to the academy, a free-flowing drive estimate and the UTC routes that were listed. Drive times are routing estimates; real journeys through ghat roads are usually longer.

UTC starts some hill services at Dehradun ISBT and others at a stop it names Dehradun Hill Station, so check which one your bus uses. The published list gives neither service class nor departure times; confirm both at utconline.uk.gov.in. Students from Haridwar and Roorkee have a rail alternative and their own pages, for Haridwar and Roorkee.

Kumaon: Kathgodam and Tanakpur are the railheads

Kumaon families travel across the state, and the railheads decide the plan. For Nainital and Almora the station is Kathgodam, where the 12092 Jan Shatabdi leaves at 05:25 and reaches Dehradun at 12:40 (7h 15m, five days a week, not Wednesday or Friday) and the 14119 Express leaves at 19:55 and reaches Dehradun at 04:40 (8h 45m, daily). From Rudrapur City the same two trains leave at 06:48 and 21:28 and take 5h 52m and 7h 12m. For Pithoragarh the railhead is Tanakpur, from where the 15020 Tanakpur-Dehradun Express leaves at 19:35 and reaches Dehradun at 07:35 (12h 00m, Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday). These times come from erail.in; confirm them on IRCTC or NTES.

• Kashipur: about 213 km by road, roughly 3.1 hours; no train to Dehradun or Haridwar appears in the timetable, and UTC lists Kashipur-Dehradun ISBT via Moradabad.
• Rudrapur: about 270 km, roughly 4.0 hours; UTC lists Dehradun ISBT-Nainital and Dehradun ISBT-Tanakpur services that pass through it.
• Haldwani: about 288 km, roughly 4.3 hours; see the Haldwani page for both trains and the bus routes.
• Nainital: about 294 km, roughly 4.9 hours; UTC lists Nainital-Dehradun ISBT via Betalghat and via Ramnagar.
• Almora: about 359 km, roughly 6.4 hours; UTC lists Almora-Dehradun ISBT via Gethia, and Almora-Dehradun Hill Station via Bageshwar and Gairsain.
• Pithoragarh: about 506 km, roughly 7.5 hours; UTC lists Pithoragarh-Dehradun ISBT via Didihat, Madkot, Ramnagar and Tanakpur.

Sainik School Ghorakhal and the Sainik route

Sainik School Ghorakhal is Uttarakhand’s school on the Sainik Schools Society list. It stands in the Nainital hills near Bhowali, about 2 km from Nainital, 21 km from Haldwani, 29 km from Almora, 47 km from Rudrapur and 54 km from Kashipur in a straight line. From the Garhwal side it is far: roughly 99 km from Kotdwar, 107 km from Pauri, 113 km from Srinagar and 114 km from Gopeshwar on the same measure. The entrance is the AISSEE, conducted by NTA, for Class VI or Class IX, and our Sainik School coaching and admission guide explain it. The nearest school outside the state is Sainik School Kunjpura in Haryana, about 125 km from Rishikesh and 107 km from Haridwar in a straight line.

RIMC is in Dehradun

Rashtriya Indian Military College is in Dehradun, which puts Uttarakhand families closer to it than almost anyone. Admission is to Class VIII. RIMC’s own admission page says one vacancy per State is generally allotted, with up to two for larger States, and its visible text gives no Uttarakhand figure. From the December 2026 cycle the application is online through NTA, the written test is held at NTA centres and the age window is 12½ to 14 years. Read the RIMC admission guide and our RIMC coaching page for the steps.

Defence in the hills

The hills have a long uniformed tradition, and a few places are worth naming as local context. Lansdowne in Pauri Garhwal district is home to the Garhwal Rifles Regimental Centre, and Kotdwar is the nearest railway station to it, 44 km away. Ranikhet in Almora district has the Kumaon Regimental Centre and the Naga Regiment centre. Joshimath Cantonment in Chamoli district is the permanent station of the Garhwal Scouts and the closest army station to the Indo-Tibetan border. The Nehru Institute of Mountaineering at Uttarkashi was founded in 1965 after the Ministry of Defence proposed it with the then Uttar Pradesh government. None of these has any tie to the academy; they are simply neighbours that students may know.

Which course for which student

After Class 10, the NDA Foundation course combines Class 11 and 12 schooling with NDA preparation. After Class 12, NDA coaching covers the written papers, and young women can read about NDA coaching for girls; UPSC accepts unmarried men and women. Degree holders look at CDS coaching, and every route ends at an SSB, for which we run a separate SSB interview course. The academy teaches in classrooms only and has no online classes. Boys and girls live in separate hostels and eat at a mess; the hostel and mess page has the details, and the fee structure shows how fees are confirmed.

Questions from hill families