Saturday, 19 October 2013

CIVIL SERVICES 2013 - MAINS STRATEGY

The CS Mains examinations begin from December 1. All the successful candidates would be busy brushing their syllabus. This time it shall be a very different and new ball game. UPSC wont stop surprising you. This time there is just a single optional and 4 GS papers. So a power-packed strategy is very essential in this game in order to have any chance of scoring. With hardly 40 days to go, by the way 40 days are sufficient to give a final blow, one must start revising all that one has been learning and more importantly one should be reading over their notes again and again. UPSC doesnt care what you know, what is more important is what you write and how well you can explain. 

 Some must haves:

 GKTODAY.IN  - this website has it all. You can register and get very good GS material for a meagre 4000 INR. You dont need to waste time in compiling important things from the newspapers and watching or listening to news everyday. gktoday will give you fully compiled pdf documents and you can read through them. They are really worth a look, if you have not yet subsribed then please do!

 mrunal.org    - Another must have site for the aspirants. This website has it all - strategies, current events and what not. Read everyday for updating yourself.

 Vajiram and Ravi notes: Another must have.
check out the current affairs notes released by them 15-20 days prior to the examination. They release the material late so as to prevent UPSC from changing the papers. Just read through these notes and correlate them with whatever you have been studying all round the year.

 UPDATE : statistics no longer relevent as UPSC removed it from 2013.

               

Economy

                                                 Theoretical economy
    Basic Concepts and terminologies, GDP,GNP,PPP,IIP, inflation etc.

    Indian economy - static portion

    • LPG reforms.
    • Budget making process.
    • RBI monetary policy: Repo, Reverse Repo, CRR, SLR etc.

    Source: Static portion of the economy

    1. NCERT Class 10, 11, 12 - DOWNLOAD HERE
    2. Indian Economy by Ramesh Singh (Tata Macgrawill Publication)
    You have to move to the next level = current affairs related to Indian and world  economy.
    1. DTC, GST,WTO, IMF, World bank etc.
    2. Various for committees formed by government and their recommendations: Kelkar, shunglu, Parekh etc.
    3. Economic Survey and Budget 2013.
    4. Eurozone crisis, American recession, dollar-rupee exchange etc.

    Source: Current affairs on economy

    1. Newspaper (The Hindu / Indianexpress / Economic Times)
    2. Anyone competitive magazine.
    3. Investopedia, Wikipedia, internet
    4. Mrunal.org/economy

    Economy Mains

    visit www.egyankosh.ac.in and download the relevant PDF files from Economics section for selective study and folder material.


    International relations

    • For mains, international relations/ diplomacy =extremely important.
    In Mains examination, The General Studies Paper II rests on four pillars
    1. International relations
    2. Economy
    3. science tech
    4. statistics
    If any one pillar is weak, your building will collapse.
    Keep an eye on websites ministry of external affairs and ministry of overseas affairs.

    Polity

    Refer to Laxmikanth. That is more than enough. But be thorough with it.

    What about the current affairs on Polity?

    • Women’s reservation bill = explicitly polity topic.
    • But at times polity related current affairs and possible questions are subtly hidden in the current affairs.
    • So be vigilant. For example, Nuke power plant issue would superficially appear as ‘environment/yearbook’ but can be well asked from Centre-State relations point of view.
    • Supreme court’s order on Ganga/Yamuna clearing would appear as “environment” topic but can be asked under Centre-State’s responsibilities in water  Management also.
    • Same goes for 2G scam, mining scams and so on. (Judicial Activism, Seperation of power, CAG Activism and so on).

    Sources for current affairs

    1. Newspaper
    2. Prsindia.org
    3. Mrunal.org/polity

    India’s Struggle for Independence by Bipin Chandra



  • Selective Study of IGNOU BA/MA History (only related to freedom Struggle) Click ME
  • Selective Study of IGNOU Tourism Course (for culture) CLICK ME
  • NOS material on Indian culture CLICK ME
  • Spectrum Book on Indian Culture

  • Environment and biodiversity


    • Mains questions: mostly current based. You must maintain notes.

    Science-Tech

    Science can be classified into following parts

    Science for Mains

    gktoday.in recommended for science and tech.
    Mixture of both theory + current affairs.
    Do (physics, chemistry and biology) from GS Manual.
    Restart the whole process one more time (once again read NCERTs and once again read GS Manual) and then solve the Mock MCQs given at the end of each chapter.
    This finishes the “theory” portion of Science. Now coming to the current affairs portion =“Sci-Tech”.

    Science-Tech for Mains

    Sources
    1. The Hindu (particularly Thursday edition)
    2. Mrunal.org/snt 
    3. Magazine (any one CST or PD): just to make sure we did not miss anything from Hindu / current affairs.
    4. Internet, incase you need to do follow up question for a particular topic e.g. Human Genome project because such things can also come under 10 marks in Mains. 
    5. And don’t too much sci-tech. If you start digging google, there is so much Science-tech going on around the world throughout the year. But Beyond a level, this has diminishing rate of returns.
    For the Science-Tech, Frequent revision is essential. Otherwise, it’d remain in your notes but you won’t be able to recall it in the exam hall.

    Public health and first aid

    • This topic is gaining quite some importance since last two mains (2011 and 2012)
    • it is a mixture of Yearbook+Sci-Tech
    • For prelims, this topic is not directly mentioned in the CSAT (Preliminary) syllabus yet 4TF MCQ questions based on diseases can come under the General Science.
    • For Mains, the syllabus explicitly mentions Public Health.

    Preparation sources/booklist for Public Health

    1. Basics of nutrition, disease, vaccination = NCERTs, GS Manual
    2. Government schemes and projects related to public health= India Yearbook Chapter on health and family welfare + and Government websites for new updates
    3. Newspaper
    4. Press release of pib.nic.in
    5. Mrunal.org/snt

    First Aid

    • Since last two years they have been asking role-playing question on First Aid treatment in the mains examination.
    • Now that Doesn’t necessarily mean that they will definitely ask a question on first aid, in the next exam but you should be prepared. Go through the following PDF file (taken from IGNOU): Click ME.

    Good governance, law and order

    These are given in General Studies Mains syllabus
    1. Law enforcement, internal security and related issues such as the preservation of communal harmony.
    2. Issues relating to good governance and accountability to the citizens including the maintenance of human rights, and of pro-bity in public life
    Best source:
    1. 2nd ARC reports. http://arc.gov.in/
    2. Yojana issues related to the themes
    3. Besides it’ll also help you in essay and interview.
    4. + any current affairs (Lokpal, Citizen carter, Whistleblower, SC judgements etc) but you’d be preparing that already under [Polity]
    You can also dig egyankosh.ac.in for good governance and law and order, but if Public Administration is not your optional then then it’ll give you diminishing rate of returns.
    If you do the above sincerely and make good notes then no one can stop you from achieving your dream. All the best!
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