GATE 2027: which second paper you can take

In GATE 2027 you may appear in one test paper or two, and if you take two, the pair must be one the organising institute has already allowed. The allowed pairs are printed as Table 4, “Allowed two test paper combinations in GATE 2027”, on printed page 13 of the GATE 2027 Information Brochure published by IIT Madras. The table is headed “(Tentative, Subject to change)”, and that label belongs with every pair read out of it. For the seven papers taught here, the allowed secondary papers are: CS — DA, EC, GE, MA, PH, RA, ST, ME; EC — CS, DA, EE, IN, PH, RA; EE — DA, EC, IN, PH, RA; IN — BM, EC, EE, ME, RA; DA — CS, EC, EE, MA, ME, PH, RA, ST, XE; BT — BM, ES, EY, XL; and CE — AE, AG, AR, ES, GE, NM, XE.

Source: GATE 2027 Information Brochure, p. 13, as on 19 September 2026

Only listed pairs are allowed

Section 6.2 of the brochure, on printed page 11, states that GATE 2027 will be conducted for 30 test papers, that Tables 3a and 3b give the list of test papers and codes, and that “A candidate is allowed to appear in ONE or TWO test papers.” It then adds the constraint that decides everything else here: “the combination of two test papers must be chosen only from the tentative list given in Table 4.” The highlights page, printed page 2, says the same in shorter form — candidates are allowed to appear for one or two test papers only, and the two test paper combinations must be chosen from the given list of combinations of test papers. So there is no step in which you assemble a pair of your own. You either find your pair printed in Table 4, or you sit a single paper.

Sources: GATE 2027 Information Brochure, p. 11, as on 19 September 2026; GATE 2027 Information Brochure, p. 2, as on 19 September 2026

Allowed second papers, for the seven papers taught here

The list may still change

Sources: GATE 2027 Information Brochure, p. 13, as on 19 September 2026; GATE 2027 Information Brochure, p. 11, as on 19 September 2026

New paper: Robotics and Automation

The highlights page on printed page 2 states that a new test paper on Robotics & Automation (RA) has been introduced in GATE 2027. It is not merely new — it is already written into the combination table. Table 4 lists RA as an allowed secondary paper for CS, EC, EE, IN and DA, which is five of the seven papers taught here. Read from RA's own row in the same table, the papers allowed as RA's secondary paper are EE, ME, DA, CS, EC and IN. Table 3a on printed page 12 gives its full name as Robotics and Automation, and the sections table on printed page 13 gives its shape: Part-A (Common), with Part-B1 (Electrical) and Part-B2 (Mechanical). BT and CE do not carry RA in their lists. Nothing in the brochure says how a new paper will be examined in practice beyond what it prints, so treat RA as a paper with a published syllabus and no history, and read that syllabus before pairing it with anything.

Sources: GATE 2027 Information Brochure, p. 2, as on 19 September 2026; GATE 2027 Information Brochure, p. 12, as on 19 September 2026; GATE 2027 Information Brochure, p. 13, as on 19 September 2026

What those two-letter codes stand for

Every allowed pair is printed twice

Table 4 runs in two halves across the page, each half with a column headed “Code of the Primary Paper” and a column headed “Codes of Papers Allowed as the Secondary Paper”. For all seven papers covered here, every paper named as an allowed secondary names that paper in return when you look up its own row: CS lists RA and RA lists CS, CE lists XE and XE lists CE, BT lists XL and XL lists BT, IN lists BM and BM lists IN. That symmetry is useful when you are checking a pair you have been told about rather than read. Look up both codes, not one. If the pair shows under only one of them you have misread a code, and if it shows under neither, it is not an allowed combination in this table however reasonable it sounds.

Source: GATE 2027 Information Brochure, p. 13, as on 19 September 2026

What Table 4 does not settle

Sources: GATE 2027 Information Brochure, p. 11, as on 19 September 2026; GATE 2027 Information Brochure, p. 2, as on 19 September 2026

Five things to check before adding a second paper

1. The pair is in Table 4 on printed page 13, checked from both codes — your paper's row, and the other paper's row.
2. The second paper's syllabus. The highlights page on printed page 2 states that the syllabus of GATE 2027 test papers has been revised and advises candidates to check it. The official PDFs are free at /resources/gate-2027-syllabus, and what changed between the 2026 and 2027 listings for the papers taught here is set out at /resources/gate-2027-syllabus-changes. RA is the exception: its syllabus is not in that PDF set, and the brochure prints it from printed page 98.
3. The fee. Printed page 13 states that details of the application fee are given per candidate per paper, in Table 5, and that the fee is not transferable. A second paper is a second fee, not a variation on the first.
4. The deadline. The brochure's Important Dates table on printed page 3 carries a line for adding a new test paper, alongside change of category, paper and examination city choices, and notes that an additional fee may be applicable per change. The dates, which the brochure marks liable to change, are on /resources/gate-2027-application-checklist.
5. That Table 4 still reads the way it did when you planned. It is labelled tentative and subject to change, so the copy on the official GATE 2027 website at the moment you pay is the one that counts.

Sources: GATE 2027 Information Brochure, p. 13, as on 19 September 2026; GATE 2027 Information Brochure, p. 2, as on 19 September 2026; GATE 2027 Information Brochure, p. 3, as on 19 September 2026; GATE 2027 Information Brochure, p. 98, as on 19 September 2026

If the pair you wanted is not printed

Table 4 gives no reasons for its choices, so an absence carries no explanation with it. BT's list is BM, ES, EY and XL. CE's list is AE, AG, AR, ES, GE, NM and XE. Neither of those lists contains CS, EC, EE, IN or DA, and neither contains RA. If the paper you had in mind is not printed against your paper, the brochure leaves the two courses of action it states on printed page 11: appear in a single test paper, or take a second paper from the list you have. Note also that the pairing question is separate from whether you may sit GATE at all. Who can appear is set out on the highlights page and at /resources/gate-2027-eligibility, and the brochure records no age limit for GATE 2027. Table 4 constrains combinations, not candidates.

Sources: GATE 2027 Information Brochure, p. 13, as on 19 September 2026; GATE 2027 Information Brochure, p. 11, as on 19 September 2026; GATE 2027 Information Brochure, p. 2, as on 19 September 2026