Neeraj Kumar Agarwal Strategy Rank-323/CSE16 Socioloy Optional, 4th Attempt,Gist of

33 Pages·2017·0.35 MB·English

Neeraj Kumar Agarwal Strategy
Rank-323/CSE16 Socioloy
Optional, 4th Attempt
Q. Details
Name Neeraj Kumar Agarwal
Rank in CSE-2016 323
Roll No. 0000642
Age 25
Total attempts in CSE
4
(including this one)
Optional Subject Sociology
Schooling Medium English
College Medium English
Medium chosen for Mains answers English
Medium chosen for Interview English
Visakhapatnam, Andhra
Home town/city
Pradesh
8 months in the social
sector(3 months with
Work-experience if any
Pratham, 5 months with
Centre for Civil Society)
Details of other competitive
RBI Grade-B: Cleared Prelims
exams, including
and Mains in 2015
success/failures
ALS for GS
Details of coaching, mock
Upendra IAS for Sociology
tests, postal material for any
(Did not join any test
competitive exam (if used)
series for prelims or mains)
IAS> IRS (IT)> IRS
Service preferences (Top-5)
(Customs)> IPS> IFS
MP> Maharashtra> Rajasthan>
state cadre preference (Top-5)
Chhattisgarh> Andhra Pradesh
Education
Education fill the details here
% in class 10 85.71
% in class 12 85.8
Graduation course and % 7.4/10
Name of college, city, passing out Chemical Engineer, IIT
year Delhi, 2013
Post-graduation No
Any other professional courses No
Hobbies & Extracurricular Music, Movies, Reading
achievements Novels
Introduction
Q. Tell us something about yourself, your family, when and why
did you enter in this field of competitive exams?
I was born in Odisha and brought up in Visakhapatnam. I hail
from a very simple business family. After I graduated from
college, I had decided to take up the placement offer I had in
hand, as my family was facing financial difficulties (I
thought I would pursue civil services later on). But my
parents convinced me pursue it at that point, rather than
delaying it. Civil services was a dream that my parents had
seen, and this acted as a catalyst for me to pursue prep. J
Electronic Vs Paper material
Q. In recent times, there is spur in electronic material-
blogs, sites, pdfs, RSS-feeds. Many aspirants feel bogged down
by this information overload. So, how do you balance this i.e.
electronic material vs. paper material (Books, newspapers)
Yes, there is an information overload. To keep this in check,
I decided to restrict myself to a few sources and sites and
focusing on reading and re-reading them, rather than diverting
myself to the multiple sources which are available.
To balance electronic material vs paper material, I preferred
standard books and self-made notes (paper material) for static
part of General Studies and Sociology (my optional). For
current affairs I preferred electronic material. I used to
make newspaper notes also online.
Online Sources which I followed:
PIB
Vision IAS Monthly Current Affair Notes (available for
free)
Mrunal
http://www.yourarticlelibrary.com/ for Sociology
Typical day in your Online life?
Online life Answer
Daily hrs spent on online platforms for
predicting cutoff / syllabus change / age- 0 (very less
attempt limit change and other “peripheral- basically)
bolbachchan“ related to civil services.
Daily hrs spent on whatsapp and telegram
30 mins
studygroups
Daily hrs spent on online for exam prep. 4-5 hours
Primary Device for online study: desktop, Laptop and
laptop, tablet, mobile mobile
Q. Any other things that you wish to elaborate on above table:
Style of Preparation and notes
making
Q. What is your style of preparation and notes making? (e.g. I
continue making notes no matter what I’m reading, I just read
multiple times but don’t maintain notes, I make mindmaps on
computer, I use xyz software etc.)
GS: I restricted myself to the sources mentioned above, and
made notes for most of the textbooks, especially bulky ones
(which include Laxmikanth and Spectrum). For prelims, I read
the books, and for mains I relied only on my hand written
notes.
Current Affairs: I maintained online notes from newspaper and
kept updating them as and when I read more on the particular
topic. I would arrange all the material topic wise at the end
of each month. This way, the notes were easy to revise and
handy.
Sociology: I made short notes for many topics, and
supplemented them with my class notes. For revision, I relied
on class notes and hand made short notes only (it is very
tedious to open the books again and again for revision, so I
feel making short notes are essential)
Prelims (CSAT) Paper-1: General
studies
Topic strategy/booklist/comment
History Ancient NCERT
History Medieval NCERT + Tamil Nadu Text Book
History Modern (Freedom Spectrum + Notes from random
Struggle) sources
11 Class NCERT + Nitin
th
Culture and society
Singhania’s book
Polity (theory + current) Laxmikanth + Newspaper
Economy (theory + current) Ramesh Singh + Newspaper
Science (theory + current) Newspaper
Environment (theory + Shankar IAS notes + Newspaper
current) + Environment ministry report
geography physical NCERT
geography India NCERT
geography world NCERT
other national/international
Newspaper
current affairs
Schemes, Policy & Filler
Newspaper + Online sources
Stuff
Q. Candidates are complaining that compared to earlier years,
Prelim 2017 GS paper was very tougher, Tickmasters’
90 strategy (and its perverted & populist version known as
+
Guessmaster-giri) and E-learning materials had limited
utility. What are you views and wisdom on all these?
Yes, the paper was tough as compared to last year. UPSC has
been making the paper dynamic year after year, and the
aspirants should appear for the exam with an open mind. During
preparation, all topics should be covered and concepts need to
be clear. UPSC may ask conceptual questions or factual
questions, aspirants need to be ready for both of them.
Q. Suppose, If you had to prepare for Prelims-2018, then after
going through this 2017 paper, what changes would you make in
your preparation?
The questions asked by UPSC were more conceptual this year,
but they were more current last year. So basically the pattern
in unpredictable. Hence, I would follow the same strategy I
followed last year, of maintaining a balance between static
and current part, and studying Culture and Environment
thoroughly.
Prelims (CSAT): Paper-2: Aptitude
Topic strategy / booklist
Maths None
Reasoning None
Comprehension None
Decision Making None
Q. In the recent two prelims (2016 and 2017), the
comprehension portion becoming quite tough and lengthy.
Candidates struggle even to finish the paper-II. Kindly
provide some words of wisdom:
Prelim accuracy
Q1. Did you attend any ‘mock tests’? Do you think they’re
necessary for success?
No I did not attend any mock tests. I solved a few questions
online just to gain some confidence. I solved previous year’s
papers (only static questions) and they were helpful in
clearing concepts, as well as to gain momentum in solving the
paper effectively.
Q2. Approximate no. of attempted answers vs. correct answers.
in Prelim-2016
attempted Official
correct (Expected)
Q. score
66 questions (expected
GS 81 122
68)
aptitude 62 56 questions(expected 54) 134
Mains: Compulsory language paper
Compulsory language
Your preparation strategy / booklist?
paper
English paper None
A day before the exam, I read a Hindi
your regional newspaper, remembered opposites etc.,
language and wrote a few paragraphs in Hindi to
gain speed in writing
Mains: Essay
Q1. How did you prepare for the essay paper?
For essay, my focus was on the structure and how the topic is
broken down so that it is easier to follow for the reader, and
is holistic as well as detailed. I gave 10 minutes per essay
for Introduction and Conclusion as they are very important
parts of any essay. I had made a few standard patterns in
which the topic could be broken: Social/economical/political,
positives/negatives/scope.
I tried to use the knowledge of the various schemes we read
and tried mentioning them in the essay if they were relevant.
I gave contemporary examples in both the essay topics.
Preparation strategy: I wrote 3 essays on previous year’s
topics, checked them myself and discussed them with a few
friends. I made structure’s for 4-5 essay topics, and refined
them after brainstorming on them to make them better. I
remembered a few basic statistics which can be used in an
essay (like literacy, sex ratio, female labour force
participation rate, unemployment rates etc.)
Q2. Which two essays did you write and What key points did you
include in it?
If development is not engendered, it is endangered.
Introduction: Started with a quote by Amartya Sen, and
explained the importance of development of both the
gender
Body: I used the parameters of Human Development Index,
to compare the status of development of men and women in
India. In detail explanation of status of both genders
with respect to education, health and per capita income
(the parameters). I highlighted the negative impact of
each of these dimensions, and how they are negatively
affecting the society at large.
Mentioned the steps that are being taken to ensure
development of female’s and what other steps can be
taken.
Cyberspace and Internet: Blessing or curse to the human
civilization in the long run?
Explained the positives and negatives of cyberspace and
internet in detail.
Discussed the reasons for the negative and why they
should be stopped.
Measures being taken: Mentioned the Budapest Convention
at the international level, and CERT-In, Cyber Security
Policy etc. at the national level.
Discussed a few other steps which can be taken.
General Studies (Mains) paper 1
Topic How did you prepare?
Same as Prelims (just
Culture
revised my prelims notes)
Indian history Spectrum and Bipin Chandra
Old NCERT (Contemporary
world history
World History)
NCERT (Politics in India
post-independence India Since Independence) and
Pradhan Mantri Web Series
Indian society
role of women, poverty etc.
Didn’t prepare anything
extra (Sociology was my
globalization on Indian society
optional)
communalism, regionalism,
secularism
world geo physical
resource distribution
NCERTs of 11 and
th
12 Class; GC Leong
th
factors for industrial location
Mrunal: for factors of
Industrial location
earthquake tsunami etc
impact on flora-fauna
General studies (Mains) paper 2
Topic How Did You Prepare?
Indian Constitution, devolution,
dispute redressal etc.
comparing Constitution with world
Laxmikanth ,
Coaching Notes (of
parliament, state Legislatures
ALS), Google
executive-judiciary
ministries departments
Covered in Sociology
pressure group, informal asso.
optional