How to work and study for civil

Services Examination
By GIRI PRASAD M
 Change your mindset
• Firstly believe that it is easy to crack the exam
while working for 8-9 hours a day.
• Many have cleared it while working.
• If your absolute aim is to clear the exam you
will definitely crack it someday.
 Resources required
1. Standard books:

• Ancient, Medieval History and General Science - Tata McGraw Hill for
General Studies
• Modern History - Brief History of Modern India by Spectrum
• Environment - Shankar IAS Academy
• Science and Tech – GkToday.in compilation from previous one year
• Economics - Mrunal + Ramesh Singh + Economic Survey + India Year Book
• Art and Culture - Facets of Indian Culture By Spectrum (Selective Reading)
• Geography - Only 11th and 12th NCERT
• Polity - Laxmikanth + VisionIAS Polity Compilation
• Current Affairs -The Hindu(Took E-notes in office) + Insights Secure
Initiative(Everyday) and MindMaps + VisionIAS monthly compilation.
 Resources required
2) Camscanner app:
To be used for reading standard books in office. I used to scan 50 pages everyday and
bring it to office for reading. Target should be completing 60-100 pages a day in a book
depending upon the difficulty level. 50 pages during work hours and 50 pages in the
night after office. Read while walking, eating and do not spend anytime with your
colleagues. Do not deviate on the day to day target. Focus Focus Focus!
If you complete 100 pages a day, a book like lakshmikanth can be completed in 5 – 8
days.
HOW TO READ SO QUICKLY?
First time when you open a book ,link it with the syllabus.
Then do a quick reading(60-100 pages a day)
Second time when you read ,read little slowly.
Third time read faster.
Fourth time when you read you will be remembering all the important points.
Repeat the above process until you are thorough enough.
Sooner you complete the process sooner you are nearer to the goal.
 Resources required
3) Using Internet in office:
Start reading thehindu online
(www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/) everyday once
you complete first read of all the standard books.
So after completing standard books office time only
for analyzing everyday news.
Read only : FrontPage, National, International,
Business and Opinion(Most important).
(2-3 hours)
Complete your office work ASAP and start reading.
 Resources required
4) Using Internet at home:
I used to read news in office and go through the following
after office hours at home.
• Insights Secure initiative(10 questions a day for mains
purpose).
• VisionIAS Monthly compilation.(From previous year)
• Insights MindMaps on important issues.
• GkToday Science and Tech,Environment,IR current
affairs(read selectively)
It will be better if you can spend 4-5 hours before going to
sleep on the above materials everyday
 Taking E-Notes
• Be it GS prelims or GS Mains or Optional,
taking current affairs notes everyday is
important.
• Notes for news can be taken in office.
• Notes for Insights, vision, gktoday and
optional can be taken at home.
Notes for mains
Notes for mains
Notes for prelims from INSIGHTS Daily current affairs quiz and
Gktoday Science and Tech
 Notes for prelims from INSIGHTS Daily current affairs
quiz(Should be started 3 months before prelims) ,Vision IAS and
Gktoday Science and Tech
 Prelims strategy
• So you have completed All Standard Books thoroughly.
• You have taken notes for Mains and Prelims as mentioned in previous slides.
• Your knowledge has improved on different topics because you have read books + news +
Insights Secure + other compilations for 8 months – one year
• Now when prelims is approaching follow the below strategy: (Assuming 3 months before
prelims)
• Assuming You are in the month of March 2017.

• Complete one Insights prelims test everyday.

• Read GKTODAY science tech and environment(Revision) from May 2016.
• Solve 10 insights current affairs quiz from May 2016.(In one day you can solve 10 days’ quiz –
so 100 questions). If important note down quiz answers under prelims notes

• So in one week you can easily complete 1.5 month’s current affairs (along with sat and sun
where there is more time available)
• A Month before prelims you would have completed almost 50 Insights test and current affairs
quiz. By now you would have acquired enough knowledge.
• Going forward you revise all standard books on polity,Environment etc. (Art and Culture and
Environment important)
 On Weekends!

• Organizations , Agreements, Laws , Policies

Schemes ,statistics.
I am stressing on the above topics separately
because it is important we revise them often so
that we can remember and recall them effectively.
In weekends working people will have additional
time which can me made use of for reading the
above concepts thoroughly.
 Organizations,Institutions and
Conventions
• Objective
• Type(Governmental, Society, NGO or International)
• Members
• Pros and Cons
• Ways to improve

• The above corresponds to all the fields like IR,environment,development etc

• No need to read in depth. Have an overall idea.

• For example : Birdlife international, CITES, Stockholm convention , Bombay Natural History
Society, National dairy development corporation etc.

• There are 100s of such organizations and institutions which we should know about.It is essential
for succeeding in prelims and mains. Spend all weekends on these topics 5 hours(assuming it is a
holiday)
• More curious you are more the organizations you can cover apart from current affairs which
everyone will do. Use Wikipedia and note basic points in your E-Notes Folder
 Agreements
• Objective
• Type(Economic,Climate change,Trade,Defense etc)
• Pros and Cons
• Ways to improve
• Is India a part of it?
• Is it beneficial to India?

• Agreements have larger impact on the global politics and

developmental agenda. In this case WTO can be considered as an
agreement rather than an organisation.SO if impact is large or was
large it Should be read in detail.
• For example : G20 , UNFCCC , WTO ,NATO,UNCTAD etc.
• Ask questions: Is WTO’s Doha round a failure? Is climate change a
myth or is it real?Is UNFCCC effective?
 Laws
• Again very important.
• Refer to the below site:
• http://www.prsindia.org/billtrack/
• Cover laws and bills in news first.

• Read Salient Provisions, Effectiveness, loopholes

and way forward. Very essential for answer writing
in GS2 and GS3.
• So practice writing about a law and criticizing it as
technically as possible . Insights Secure initiative
will be of great help.
 Policies
• Always Have a single consolidated word file for
this. Focus on Objective ,Provisions and status
of its implementation.
So many policies are there. Know the most
important ones like National Children Policy,
National Foreign Trade Policy, Industrial,
Agricultural,Foreign,Health,Hydrocarbon and
Educational Policies etc. The chances of your
success lies in your ability to read the most
important and expected Policies in detail.
 Schemes
• Reference:
• http://www.insightsonindia.com/2017/04/10/
insights-prelims-2017-revision-modules-
government-schemes-programmes-module-
june-2016-march-2017/
 Statistics
• All the facts like % of GDP spent on education,
Rank of india in HDI, What are the parameters
to determine poverty comes under this
umbrella. Also indexes , reports of organisations
OECD and World Bank comes under this.
• Gender Gap , Sex ratio and so on.
• Important if you need one extra mark in all the
answers you write. Have notes so u can revise
again and again before exam.
 Commissions and Committees
• What is the recommendation of Urjit Patel
Committee?What was it all about?
• Like this you need to know all the committees
and their purpose (Covering Past one year’s is
enough)
 Optional PSIR
My Optional strategy and notes:
• https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B5qK_Uo
vBCPyZU5WOGNfUURlWEU
 Mains?
• If you follow the above sincerely no need to
prepare separately for mains.
• Since you are going through 10 secure
initiative questions and answers everyday,
your answer writing will improve well. Once In
a week write one or two answers and evaluate
urself.
 Word of caution and hope
• Working and preparing is not a rule but exception.
But if you are sincere and determined, you can do it.
All you have to face is 1.5-2.5 years of hectic life
which will fly away like a breeze once u succeed.
• My strategy is not rigid. You can change it as per your
requirement.
• All the best. Further queries will be addressed in the
same presentation. I would be happy even if one
person benefits through my guidance.