Prelims - learnings from the D day by Neha Banerjee( AIR 20, CSE 2019)

This post will walk you through the real experience of the prelims along with the general points one should keep in mind before and during the exam. It will also have a detailed discussion on various hacks that can be used to arrive at the correct answer and thus score high marks. 

Real Experience of the D day

The day was 2nd June 2019 and my exam centre was somewhere around 25 km from my residence. The summer heat was absolutely scorching and I barely managed to sleep the night before ( it is highly advised to get a good sleep before Prelims). A small advise to future aspirants would be to visit the exam centre well before the exam in order to avoid last minute worries. I avoided last minute revisions and tried to keep myself as calm as possible before the exam. Unlike any board/university exam , one can never accurately anticipate the questions to be asked in the exam. So your mind needs to be open enough to face diverse questions from diverse topics. If you are too stressed out in revising facts just before the exam ( I mean since the night before) , then you may face difficulty in adapting to situations in case not a single question is asked from whatever you were revising just before the exam. So , keep your calm and enter the exam hall with full faith on yourself. 

 

While giving the Paper 1  exam  , the first 5 to 6  questions in my set were not known to me directly. It did frighten me a bit, but I refused to give up . I turned the pages and started marking the first answer in the OMR sheet around 10 minutes since the start of the exam. In the first round I marked around 40 to 50 questions  and for the rest I encircled the questions ( since I was not sure ..or I had to select between 2 close options). In the second iteration I marked around 40 questions ( this time with a deeper thought process) and finally the rest . Overall I attempted 97 questions out of 100 . 

 

While giving Paper 2 in the second half ( CSAT) , I was not that serious and felt that anyway we need to score only 33 %. But this attitude could have been fatal. Moreover due to the extreme heat I felt dehydrated and  lost heavily on this paper. Due to less attention, I even marked some answers wrong in the omr even after knowing them correctly.

My general takings after the process :- 

1) Practice Prelims tests with proper OMR sheet etc. ( at least 2 or 3 before the exam.). Carry a pencil with you in case you want to erase an option in omr after entering it. It is advisable to keep marking the answers in the omr simultaneously as you solve questions ( since, many times we make mistakes at the end due to haste)

2) Do practice some CSAT mock tests before the exam ( at least 5 to 10 previous year papers). You do not want your precious efforts to be ruined just because of this carelessness.

3) Emulate real exam like situations while giving mocks with respect to timings (as all of us may not be morning persons :P) , comfort and weather ( all centres may not have a fan directly overhead you). These may sound very petty but on the D day you dont want to leave any stone unturned , be it mental or physical preparation.  

4) Mark your answers on the sheet so that you can check those after the exam. But please avoid wasting time in speculating the cut-off etc. Rely on some authentic sources for answer keys and straight away start with your Mains preparation. 

Specific Takings and Tips to score high :-

 I have listed out my sources and prelims specific preparation strategies in an earlier post. So in this section, I will give some useful insights as to how to think and what exactly goes on in the mind of the student while giving the exam. These may not be applicable for all and under all scenarios though. I will corroborate the ideas with exact examples from the Prelims 2019 paper. 

1) Eliminate only one obvious option to reach the final answer 

It is a well known fact that India still imports coal , thus point 3 is not correct is not correct and therefore answer is 1. So , remember answer is hidden in the question only . You just have to play with the options and make best possible use of them 

  If you have read Laxmikanth , then you know that "Office of Profit" is not Well defined ( notice the term used ) . So only a can be the correct answer

     

If you have read Spectrum / any other history book , you would know that Gandhiji always supported recruitment of Indians in World War . So 2 is incorrect and this only b is the correct answer

 If you have gone through previous year prelims paper or any Current  Affair pdf , you would know that Chambal river is related to Gharial and not Irrawady dolphin. ( or you may know where irrawady dolphin may be found  ). So 2 goes out and only c is the correct answer. 

2) Applying common sense and basic logic and making the best of whatever you know 

EPR is an important concept in environmental regulations But as per options, 1998 -99 is way too early for it ( educated guess) . So among left over options c and d , d is concerned with food safety ..and epr is not about it ..so answer is c 

 

Anyone having a smartphone or anyone who has seen its ads would notice that LTE is related to 4G . So, option 1 is wrong . Now the name VoLTE suggests that it must be something more then just LTE ...that is voice and data . thus, 2. is also wrong. So here, even without knowing the exact answer, one could play with question wordings. 

    

Anyone who has read basic current affairs would know it is lead by China ..so point 2 seems absurd. Now , you are left with option a and c. Observe , that by common logic point 1 and 3 can never be together. I mean if there are more than 80 members , then how can it be only limited to Asia. so , a is the correct answer.
  

   This is a classic example of reversed statements. Notice that the definition of AR , VR has been reversed. So reading the question carefully is also important.  Thus , option a and c goes out. So you only have to decide  is right . Take the negation of the statement . Is it true ? Obviously no. Thus answer is b. You have to be a bit careful in these type of logical deduction . 

In this question , I only knew from my current affair study that the H CNG reduces CO emission by around 70 percent . So point 1 is gone. Now in the option you have to choose between 4 and (2,3) . Obviously the latter seems more probable. The idea behind this example is to encourage you not to leave a question until it is absolutely necessary and do whatever possible.

    

This type of questions in Art and culture leads to the conception that this section is low scoring. But observe the options carefully and apply common sense. How is it possible to be so historically accurate about whether wages were given weekly or only the eldest son was a labourer...( we are talking of ancient India ). Among the remaining 2 , option a appears the  most sane ( notice the word sort of tax) .

3) Conceptual clarity , Conscience and Other Insights 

In many of the questions I found that my mains preparation helped in prelims as well. Further, some basic concepts were also asked which required no memorization of facts at all  ( I am not attaching the photographs, but listing them here)  Examples being:- 

a) Conceptual questions from Polity ...like definition of liberty 

b) Conceptual questions from Economy ...like land reforms, official poverty lines in States, New and Old world crops which we learn in industrial locations GS Paper 1 , purchase power parity concept, slide of Indian rupee, money multiplier,reducing currency crisis risk and Five Year Plans ( notice it is still important for Post Independence Economy, social capital. 

c) Conceptual questions from Geography ...dew formation, cloud thinning to reduce global warming, Summer solstice etc, 

d ) For the rest of the paper,  my strategy as mentioned in the earlier post helped me. Example:- I was aware that one has to be thorough with world maps ( direct question on border of seas and countries) , India maps ( Zemu glacier, National Parks , protected areas had 2 or 3 questions, rivers also came ex, Pandharpur Chandrabhaga etc. ) , studying Laxmikanth indepth ( like the 99th Amendment, Article 142 etc) and Spectrum indepth ( all questions from Modern History was doable from here) , New Ncerts for Ancient, medieval ( ex, Mir Bakshi as a Mughal office ) 

e) Conscience :- There were some questions where I had to completely guess. Example the "denisovan" question was right.  I took the risk but some went wrong as well ( example the Himalayan nettle question) . 

These are my views after taking the exam  and there is no guarantee that these techniques are universally applicable. Thus, I encourage the readers to analyse previous year questions , watch relevant videos and solve mock test papers to come up with even better ways to tackle the Prelims exam. My best wishes !