Cervical lymphadenopathy is one of the common clinical presentations encountered in day to day clinical practice. It has a large number of differential diagnosis which varies from an inflammatory process to malignant condition. Fine needle aspiration cytology is a very simple, rapid and cost effective diagnostic technique in evaluation of the causes of lymphadenopathy and aid in treatment planning. To study the cytopathological features in patients presenting with cervical lymphadenopathy and to analyse the various etiological causes of cervical lymphadenopathy in respect to age and sex. A retrospective study was conducted on cases of cervical lymphadenopathy whose FNAC was done during a 2 year period in the Department of Pathology of a Tertiary care hospital and the data was analysed. Out of 838 cases 51% were male and 49% were female and the peak age ranged between 11-20 years. 71.8% cases were benign of which reactive lymphadenitis (38.18%) was found to be the commonest followed by granulomatous lymphadenitis (31.5%). Metastatic deposits were found in 25.6% cases of which 53% cases were suggestive of squamous cell carcinoma, 16.35% cases were adenocarcinoma and 30.4% cases were poorly differentiated carcinoma. 22 cases were lymphomas of which 2 cases were of Hodgkin’s lymphoma and the rest were Non Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. Reactive lymphadenitis were common in the age group of 0-20 years whereas metastasis were mainly found in the elderly age group. Reactive lymphadenitis, granulomatous lymphadenitis and metastasis are important causes of cervical lymphadenopathy. FNAC is a very useful diagnostic technique which provides a rapid diagnosis and helps in confirmation or exclusion of a clinical diagnosis.