DECODING THE PRELIMINARY EXAMINATION:

 Friends, :-)

I have been a little occupied in some personal stuffs from last few days, so I couldn’t come up with a new post. The prelims exam is so close and optional paper can be dealt later. So, here I am sharing my experience of ‘tryst with prelims’.

(In the following posts, I will try to share gist of ccrt notes, ncert biology ecology portion 12^th and practicing maps)

If something gives me goose-bumps even today it’s the preliminary exam. Just a few thousands are selected among lakhs of aspirants. (Success ratio is approximately 3%).

When it comes to Indian Forest Services, since 2013 after the preliminary exam has been introduced which is common for civil services exam, for obvious reasons it is the toughest stage now. Half of the battle is won once one manages to clear the exceptionally high cut off of prelims exam for IFS.

And it is doable- Trust me it is! One just need to catch the pulse of the exam. Next two weeks are most crucial as no matter from how many days, months or years one has been preparing for the exam, 70% of the memory is clustered with the things we have memorized recently. It is very similar to the race, the athlete who puts his best in last fraction of the second wins the game. And as it is said ‘ Ant bhala toh sab bhala.’- So game is still on!

Previous year trend of cut off (general category):

Year	CSE	IFS
2013 (Total marks 400)	241 (60.25%)	267 (66.75%)
2014 (Total Marks 385)	205 (53.24%)	237 (61.55%)
2015 (Total Marks 200)	107.34(53.67%)	121.34(60.67%)

 So, what’s the trick? How to get the edge?

Now! Since there are just 100 questions and just 200 marks, the exam is dicey. And there is only the General studies paper which is the forte of many students. To survive in this competition, a few things could be tried (which helped me to clear the IFS cut off last year- there is never one size fits all kind of mantra)

1.       Revision is the key. 

Yes! I know we have heard this again and again but when it comes to choose between revising what we have already studied or finishing the syllabus, we tend to get confused.

 First of all there is nothing called ‘I am done with the syllabuses’ because GS is limitless, anything under the sun can be asked. Let me explain why revision is the key- Last year we had a question from polity:

CSP-2015

To uphold and protect the Sovereignty, Unity and Integrity of India” is a provision made in the:

(a)Preamble of the constitution

(b) Directive Principles of state policy

(c) Fundamental rights

(d) Fundamental duties.

This is a very simple question. The line is taken as it is from the article 51 A (c)

There is hardly any serious aspirant who was not aware of it. Still many got it wrong- reason is lack of revision. We tend to get confused between the options. But when we read the same thing again and again, chances of making this error minimize significantly. Because sometimes question is as simple as it looks, there is no need to complicate it. And sometimes question is not as simple as it looks. A proper judgment has to made before attempting every single question.

Here is where revision helps.

2.       Be clear with basics. 

Basics! 

I am emphasizing the word basics. This is not mains exam. Here we are not asked to write eloquent answers or present our view point.  

We don’t need to know the Shortcomings of Jan Dhan Yojna, only knowing when it was started; by whom, concerned authorities and the major aim is more than enough at least at this stage.

Question (CSP-2015) Pradhanmantri Jandhan yojna was launched for?

(a)Providing housing loans to poor people at cheaper interest rates

(b) Promoting women’s SHG in backward areas

(c) Promoting financial inclusion in the country.

(d) Promoting financial help to marginalized community.

3.       Current affairs:

 Make one thing for sure, Mostly questions are not asked out of the blue. If UPSC is asking any question even though it is a very traditional question, there has to be some logic. ( There are few random questions, but then these are random for all, we don't need to attempt 100 questions anyway)

For example;

In 2014 we had a question from science and tech regarding biometrics

In addition to fingerprint scanning, which of the following may be used in the biometric identification of a person?

1.       Iris scanning

2.       Retinal Scanning

3.       Voice recognition

Select the correct answer

(a)1 only

(b) 2 and 3 only

(c) 1 and 3 only

(d) 1,2 and 3

Reason was Aadhar card was introduced and right to privacy related to misuse of biometric information was one of the major concerns.

4.       Mapping:

 Do we need to mug up the whole Map (that’s not a wise thing to do for non-geography students) I tried to decode a trend.

2013: Atlas mountain- Arab Spring North Africa was in the news.

2014: Black Sea- Ukraine crisis.

2015: Zordan- ISIS

So, definitely it is a good idea to have a good command over the map( I am coming up with MAPPING Strategy specially for prelims in the next post) but the focus should be on areas that has been in the news (hot topics actually).

5.       Dynamic topics: Ecology and Culture;

Any guesses on why ‘kalamkari’ was asked last year in 2015? Well! Telangana was formed a year back, ‘kalamkari’ art belongs to Telangana/ Andhra pradesh.

And Then GI status question was asked. Well it was because articles related to GI were featured again and again in the Hindu newspaper last year. And reading only the articles was definitely not enough. We need to be curious enough to do a little research over any such topic that has reoccurred in the newspaper. (And make it fun, my roommate always preferred Assam tea over Darjeeling tea after know the GI status).

 Kalaripayattu Marital art was in news because this little known art form was to be proposed to be featured in the Bollywood movie Baaghi (2015).

But then all questions on culture can’t be guessed. So it is enough to study culture from the standard sources: NCERT (old) Ancient and Medieval- Selected chapters. CCRT (website or photocopied notes) and spectrum (not actually not required, just a quick glance and filtering out factual things and marking in the book itself won’t hurt anyway).

6.       Ecology: 

Since 2013 culture and ecology accounts for almost 1/3^rd of the paper. Where cut off is just a little over 60%, 33-35% matters a lot. There is no one stop solution for ecology. However, selected chapters from 12^th Biology NCERT will cover it mostly. Get the basics correct, that’s all that matter. Environment and Ecology by Majid Hussain is a good book, if one has not read it, she may try to have a glance on the maps and the chapters on legislation and organisation. Even notes on ecology from NIOS is pretty good.  (But there is absolutely no need to panic if one has not referred these sources. )

Quick tips:

1.       Darkening the wrong circles in the answer booklets is the biggest sin one can commit. Practice at least 5 papers (if you haven’t solved any till date)

2.       This is not the time to make notes, depending on the individual strategy one can point down important facts in a copy and whatever new information you come through in the coming days (one copy- not many copies with scattered notes)- like I did for CCRT last year, it helped me for the quick revision.

3.       Condition your biological clock, we need to be fully awake between 9am to 12pm on the examination day, conditioning requires at least 15-20 days. If one is practicing mock, it is good to practice it at the same time.

4.       CSAT is qualifying, but that doesn’t mean that one need to deliberately leave the questions there. Over-confidence is lethal.

5.       Enjoy the process- you never know what’s the paper has in store for you. I remember I had argument with my father in the morning just before entering the exam venue that I am not going to take any risk and will not attempt more than 75 questions, given approximately 60 will be correct, I will manage to get 110 (which I assumed to be a safe score for IFS). But that time I didn’t know that UPSC is going to surprise me, I attempted 90+ questions and proved me wrong too as the Cut off soared high.

I have tried to address the doubts; those came to my mind the fortnight before my exam. If anything else is bothering, please comment in the box given. I will try to address them in my capacity.

And at last this exam is about ‘nishkama Karma’; if it is your day no one is going to stop you. Believe in yourself and your preparation level. Believe in your sacrifices and sleepless nights. 

My father reiterates- ‘labor can’t go unrewarded’

All the best! :)

Upcoming articles- Black horse of zoology syllabus- Biostatistics and economic zoology (Fetch marks like anything):Tame it with the right strategy!