Hi

Yes, you can write the answers of your sociology optional paper in kannada.

This is because,

The UPSC Prelims and Mains examination question paper are set in both English and Hindi except the language papers -A and B in mains examination while prelims examination is objective, Mains examination is subjective and  you have the option to write your  answers in English  or in any one of the Eighth Schedule languages .

So, beside English , you have the option to write answers in the language included

in the Eighth Schedule to the Constitution which consists of  22 languages  listed below:-

-) Assamese

-) Bengali

-) Gujarati

-) Hindi

-) Kannada

-) Kashmiri

-) Konkani

-) Malayalam

-) Manipuri

-) Marathi

-) Nepali

-) Odia

-) Punjabi

-) Sanskrit

-) Sindhi

-) Tamil

-) Telugu

-) Urdu

-) Bodo

-) Dogri

-) Maithili

-) Santhali

So, you can definitely write your Sociology optional  answers in kannada.

To help you for further, here's a brief of UPSC examination pattern

UPSC civil services examination  has 3 stages listed below :-

*prelims exam :- it is objective paper and is of qualifying nature , so you just  need to at least qualify it to be eligible for mains examination, the score /marks obtained by you in your prelims examination is not added up or used in your final merit. Your prelims exam consist of 2 papers: -

-) general studies 1

-) general studies II ( csat )

You get 2 hours for each paper

*Mains exam. :- it is descriptive /written examination . There are a total of 9 papers  which are listed below:-

-) paper A :- compulsory indian language.

-) paper B :- english

-) essay

-) general studies I

-) general studies II

-) general studies III

-) general studies IV

-) optional I

-) optional II

The compulsory indian language and english are qualifying in nature . You just need to qualify them. The marks obtained by you in these two papers will not be counted towards merit list.

*Interview :- After qualifying mains, you have to go through interview round, and it is more of test of your personality rather than knowledge.

For detailed information , I will recommend you to go through our page the link for the same is provided below

https://school.careers360.com/articles/how-to-become-an-ias-officer

Thank you