I am working in a public Sector Bank as an officer but want to prepare...
“If like me, an aspirant has less time to prepare and revise, it is important to analyze the Return Of Investment that each topic under the syllabus will give you” – KAJAL JAWLA, AIR-28, UPSC CSE 2018
Some of the tips that’ll help you prepare for UPSC while working are:
Follow the 80-20 principle:
The Pareto principle, also known as the 80/20 rule, is a management theory which states that 80 percent of the output from a given situation is determined by 20 percent of the input. So prioritise your time, effort, and study materials. Put effort into the 20% area which can bring 80% results.
Devote your time only to those topics that will help you pass the IAS exam. Even after devoting a lot of time, there will be a few topics that will be difficult to grasp. Instead of wasting time on such topics, you should use that time to improve your skills in the areas where you excel.
Read NCERTs & UPSC booklist:
No matter what your background is, you need to understand the basics of the core subjects of the UPSC syllabus. Hence, reading NCERTs is important. You can refer to the essential NCERTs books for each subject given below to save time. Questions and important concepts are usually based on these books.
• History: Class 6 to 12 NCERTs
• Geography: Class 11 and 12 NCERTs
• Economics: Class 12 NCERT
• Polity: Class 11 and 12 NCERTs
• Science & Tech: Class 6 to 10 NCERTs
Then proceed to study the UPSC booklist mentioned below to expand your knowledge:
• Modern History: Spectrum
• Medieval History: Satish Chandra
• Polity: Laxmikanth
• Geography: GC Leong, Atlas
• Art & Culture: Nitin Singhania
• Economics: Ramesh Singh
If you can’t find the time to devote to reading all these books, you can refer to the NCERT summaries to get the gist of each subject. For an in-depth yet fast way to complete NCERTs, you can also check out EduRev’s courses on these subjects. It contains summaries and topic-wise tests of both the NCERTs and the books mentioned in the recommended booklist. The notes are detailed and structured and if you have trouble understanding any concept, you can ask your doubts on the discussion forum where thousands of UPSC aspirants and teachers are active.
Practice Answer Writing + Revision:
Answer-writing practice and revision play an important role in the entire scheme of UPSC preparation, especially for the UPSC Mains Exam. Once you have completed a subject from the NCERT as well as standard books, then you can start practicing answer-writing. Before that, it will be a futile exercise as you will have to depend on books for the content of the answer. At this stage, it is also important to incorporate consistent revision. You should keep your weekends free for a dedicated revision of whatever new you’ve learned during the week.
Mock Based Test Learning approach:
Two months before the prelims exam, you should incorporate a mock test-based learning approach. It will give you an exam feel. Once you get acclimatized, it will reduce exam-time stress.
Stay updated on Current Affairs:
Making notes from important newspapers like The Hindu, The Indian Express, Yojana and Kurukshetra Magazine can be a task in itself, especially since it takes 4-5 hours as a beginner to make their notes. You can also refer to EduRev’s Current Affairs monthly compilation on The Hindu, PIB, Yojana and Kurukshetra magazine. The news gathered from The Hindu is divided on the basis of GS topics and interlinked with all the relevant subjects. This will save a huge amount of time for you and make the news easy to relate with the static topics.