What to write & What not to
write in Mains IAS exam?
1.
Think for Thirty
Minutes
2.
What *NOT* to write in
an Essay?
3.
Provokative Essays
4.
Don’t get Personal
(Cong.vs BJP)
5.
Quoting the Famous
Quotes
6.
Padding with Fodder
Material
7.
Suggested Reading
8.
Reading Books as a
Hobby
9.
Related articles
This is
what I learned from my seniors and toppers.
There are plenty of articles on internet on how to prepare the essay (=read editorials daily etc.) I’m writing one about how to ‘actually’ write it inside the exam hall.
In the Essay paper, they give you 4-5 essays and you’ve to write only one.
There are plenty of articles on internet on how to prepare the essay (=read editorials daily etc.) I’m writing one about how to ‘actually’ write it inside the exam hall.
In the Essay paper, they give you 4-5 essays and you’ve to write only one.
Time limit -3 hours, Max-marks=200.
(Now 250)
In a 2
marker question, UPSC specifically mentions that answer it in 20 words. So with
that logic, you’re expected to write an essay containing around 2000 words for the 200 marks (18-20 pgs).
before
you start the Essay writing
Take this example.
They asked an essay on Gandhi, I start writing it. I write something like
Take this example.
They asked an essay on Gandhi, I start writing it. I write something like
Gandhi
was born in Porbandar & then He went to England…africa..come back…freedom
struggle..Gandhi-Irwin..2nd round table….partition…etc.
After 1
hour of writing, I realize that I forgot mention about Champaran’s Indigo
Struggle when Gandhi got actively involved in Indian Freedom struggle for the
first time! Now I can’t add it. Because there is no space in initial pages.
However I can still try to add it in the conclusion like
…in 1947
Gandhi won the fight he started with Champaran…”
But when
Examiner doesn’t find the mention of Champaran in the initial pages, then he
gets an impression you forgot it = less
marks. Hence everything has to be
written in its place.
That’s
why you must…..
√ Think for 30-45 minutes before you start the Essay writing
You’ve 3
hours to write the essay. Don’t immediately start
- 1st
try to recall everything that you can remember / want to say about the
essay. - Take
a pencil and write them all (in very brief) on the end of the answer
sheet - See
if there is any chance of adding some diagram or table in it?
|
Do you
remember any?
|
*Related
to that topic, What are the
|
Once you’re done adding everything that you can
think about, regarding the essay- then give those topics, order of preference.
1.2.3.4.
The order is very important, just like in wedding parties you start with Soup…dal-roti and…Ice cream in the end.
The order should be :-
The order is very important, just like in wedding parties you start with Soup…dal-roti and…Ice cream in the end.
The order should be :-
1. Introduction
2. Background / History related
3. Main concept / theory / what the subject is about
4. Current scenario related to it.
5. Good sides
6. Negative sides / obstacles
7. Suggested reforms
8. Conclusion
Everything
has to be written in its place.
Gandhi’s Champaran must come in the beginning not in the end.
Gandhi’s Champaran must come in the beginning not in the end.
Now SOME
DON’Ts
1.
Autocracy is better than democracy. (know that it’s the democracy that’s
allowing you to criticize it) so you should never justify certain solution to
India’s problems.
2. Excessive criticism of Govt. / administration (I mean the frontline and The Hindu’s stand)
3. Seeing negative sides without suggesting reforms in it.
2. Excessive criticism of Govt. / administration (I mean the frontline and The Hindu’s stand)
3. Seeing negative sides without suggesting reforms in it.
Sometimes
the essay topics are given in such a way, that you want to agree all the way. e.g.
- Panchayati
raj is wastage of tax payer’s money. (yes it seems so, just like NREGA but
when you’re writing an Essay you need to maintain some balance)
- Poor
people are their own enemies.
In such
cases – just because he gave you statement doesn’t mean you’ve to sing in his
tune throughout the paper.DO NOT forget to show the other side of the mirror.
It’s easier to criticize non- working things than to fix it. (Remember this all time during essay.)
Don’t give filmy solutions to real life problems. (Munna Bhai MBBS / Slum Dog Millionaire.)
It’s easier to criticize non- working things than to fix it. (Remember this all time during essay.)
Don’t give filmy solutions to real life problems. (Munna Bhai MBBS / Slum Dog Millionaire.)
- Don’t
go naming individual politicians – their achievement / scandals (Kalmadi,
Raja,Amar Singh etc.), (except in the foreign policy related essay, where
you’ve to analyse from entire Nehru’s Panchsheel era to Vajpayee’s Lahore
Bus visit and current affairs.) our Foreign policy has changed with every
prime minister so their names need to be mentioned.
- Never
write essay talking like “Congress did this and BJP did that.” It’s
the trait of a common man, not of a future officer.
- Give
a balanced answer without getting into hero-worship or mud slinging
- If
criticizing Government in the essay alone was going to make you IAS
officer, then every journalist of Aaj Tak would be an IAS officer.
- An
officer’s trait is to remain ‘anonymous’,
‘faceless’ and neutral- meaning your essay should
look like it has been written by a graduate.
Same
applies for
1.
Religion / culture/ language-literature (in philosophical essays)
2. States (in polity / federalism / Development)
I’m not saying you should transform into a sterile person writing the essay without having any personal view/ opinion or righteous anger but, you mustn’t become too much passionate about certain things.
I’m saying all this because you can never be sure about what will be the political / ideological / religious / regional alignment of the examiner.
This suggestion also applies while dealing with Public Administration (optional subject).
2. States (in polity / federalism / Development)
I’m not saying you should transform into a sterile person writing the essay without having any personal view/ opinion or righteous anger but, you mustn’t become too much passionate about certain things.
I’m saying all this because you can never be sure about what will be the political / ideological / religious / regional alignment of the examiner.
This suggestion also applies while dealing with Public Administration (optional subject).
1. Don’t make mistakes in writing who said what. e.g.
you quote Abraham Lincon’s sentence and write George Washington said it. Nothing
will make you look more stupid in the eyes of the examiner than that.
2. Quote exactly
as it was said. Mao said “Power flows from the barrel of a gun” so you should
not write it as
”barrel of the gun contains
power”
or
“muzzle of the gun flows the power”
or
“muzzle of the gun flows the power”
You must quote the quote verbatim. If
you’re not sure then don’t quote it.
Even in the worst
case, you’re supposed to write 1200-1500 words for a 200 marks essay.
Padding means, you don’t know the exact answer so you just beat around the bushes and write the garbage stuff to fill up the pages, while this tactic does work in the school and college exams but don’t try it in the essay paper.
Padding means, you don’t know the exact answer so you just beat around the bushes and write the garbage stuff to fill up the pages, while this tactic does work in the school and college exams but don’t try it in the essay paper.
Don’t write too many proverbs / quotes/ (invented)
case studies/examples per page. It makes the examiner think that you’ve no
input of your own so you’re just filling up the pages.
Do not pick up the subject where your idea or thought
content is very low.
- Ex.
you picked up “Do we need nuclear power” – So you start with how
thermal power-stations create pollution, there is huge demand and low
supply of electricity, nuke power is cheap, and then the dangers such as
Japanese Tsunami etc.
- After
4 pages, your thoughts and ideas are exhausted-you’ve nothing more to say
and assuming that you write 100 words per page, you realise that only 400
words won’t get you any marks ! Now you can’t scratch those pages and
write a new essay on new topic, you’ve wasted enough time on this one.
- So
you decide to continue with this nuke-power essay and start rewriting the
same stuff you already stated in different ways and then you’ll deviate
from the main topic- like nuke power is unsafe as we saw in Japan, so we
need to switch to renewable energy source like Sun, Wind and Water ->
then 4 pages on advantages of renewable energy as if this is an essay on “the
benefits of Non-renewable energy” and not on nuke power, you write
about the pro-cons of hydro-electricity like dams and displacement of
people.
- Then
you realise “OMG, displacement of people also applies while making
nuke-power plants like in Maharashtra!“ so you come back to the
topic -half page written but still you’ve not filled up enough pages so
you start talking about to land-acquisition policy and start writing the
pro-cons.. Another half page on it. Then you think “oh i must talk
something about the Indo-US nuke deal” so you go on talking about
how we haven’t signed the CTBT and yet N.S.G gave us clearance and China-Pakistan
couldn’t stop it so we are a global power now and we deserve a permanent
seat in UNSC! This kind of padding goes on until time is up.
- You’ve
messed up the whole thing; you totally deviated from the subject. Your
essay doesn’t have any flow of thoughts or proper rhythm. The seasoned
examiners immediately sniff out this padding and they don’t give much mark
for it, your expected score for this kind of garbage writing is less than
50/200, means even with decent score in all other papers, your chances of
getting interview call is close to zero.
You’ve jeopardised your chances of
selection in IAS, you’ve dug your own grave. That’s why
1. Take great care in
picking up the subject
2. First 30-40 minutes for
thorough thinking.
3. Stick to the subject
Same
applies while dealing with the big 60 marker question in GS and optional
papers. (Not 30 minutes of thinking but at least 5-7 minutes!)
Essay is not something that can be learned reading
one book or reading for 1 month.
It’s a continuous and long process takes some diverse reading before you’ve enough content to write something decent and something big enough to fill 20 pages to fetch 100+ marks.
It’s a continuous and long process takes some diverse reading before you’ve enough content to write something decent and something big enough to fill 20 pages to fetch 100+ marks.
- Editorials
of English newspapers ( but don’t get swayed about by either leftist
or capitalist stuff preached by both sides) - Magazines
like Frontline, Yojana, Kurukshetra. (it gives you the fodder material:
statistical data to quote like how many % illiterate and so on but again don’t use
too much statistical data for padding and most importantly don’t ‘invent’
your own case studies and stat.data)
- Watch
English news channel – discussions / debates.
- See
the old question papers and try
to make an outline of each and every Essay asked so far.
To
increase your idea and ‘fodder-material’ for brain storming, you can read some
books outside studies, related to Indian culture, democracy and Development,
just for time-pass for example
- Imagining India by Nandan Nilekani
- India 2020: A Vision For The New Millennium by Dr.
Kalam
- India After Gandhi: The History Of The World’s Largest
Democracy by Ramchandra Guha
- The Discovery of India by Jawaharlal Nehru
Me and my ruined essay
In 2009′s mains attempt, I got only 20/200 marks in
the Essay. It was about ‘are we a soft state?’. I wrote it only from the
foreign policy and law-n-order point of view, without seeing the cultural
-historical contexts. It was a monotonous
essay without any spark. Moral of the story: do try to see different angles of the
subject and give a thorough thought before you start writing.
Some veterans are in opinion that you should pick
up the essay on technical subject, example space-technology, advances in medical
science, how IT has changed lives and so on. Because only a few people attempt
them, and due to technical nature, your ideas are unlikely to be in conflict
with the examiner so you’ll get more marks.
But then again you need enough ‘content’ to write 1500+
words else the padding route=digging your own grave. And there are enough
toppers who wrote the non-technical essay and still got in the top-merit list
so as usual for every generalisation made about UPSC, you’ll find a counter
example!
Predicting Essays for 2011
Mains paper
- As
usual coaching classes try to anticipate which essays will be asked, and
UPSC makes sure they are not asked. So be prepared for
- everything-
don’t just rely on selected hot-topics like Lokpal and Civil society.
- In
old times, it was quite predictable, see the papers from 1997 to 2006:
almost every year there is an essay on polity-judiciary, one on women
- empowerment,
one on Science-tech, one on democracy and governance. But nowadays UPSC is
rapidly breaking the trends.
- Lets
look @ the 2010 paper. People predicted: there will be some essay on
games, due to CWG or Asiad or even on corruption and good Governance given
CWG and 2G scams. But there was nothing.
- I’m
putting the comparative list of essays asked in last two years (2009 and
2010). Make your own judgement and prediction and prepare accordingly.
Vulnerable groups of society (India vs. Bharat
Debate)
- Should
a moratorium be imposed on all fresh mining in tribal areas of the
country? (2010) (can be classified as current affairs due to Mines
regulation bill)
- Are
our traditional handicrafts doomed to a slow death? (2009)
- From
traditional Indian philanthropy to the Gates-Buffet model-a natural
progression or a paradigm shift?-2010
- The
focus of health care is increasingly getting skewed towards the ‘haves’ of
our society-2009
International relations
- Preparedness
of our society for India’s global leadership role. 2010
- Are
we a soft state? 2009
- Good
Fences make good neighbors. 2009
One more
bad news: in 1997 to 2006 era, UPSC gave 6 subjects and you had to write one
essay, in 2009: five options and in 2010 : only 4 options.
(Coutesy:
mrunal.org)
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