The Final Assault - CSE 2014 !!

As I begin preparing for my fourth and final assault (i.e. the attempt) on Civil Service Exam, I thought to outline a strategy and a timeline for it. May God takes away all my laziness, procrastination and casualness from me, forever. Amen :) !!

Strategy:
- To strengthen reliable areas like Philosophy Paper-I, GS Paper-I & III.
- To prepare unreliable portions like Philosophy Paper-II, GS-II, IV and Essay in a way so as to mitigate the uncertainty & low scores. 
   P.S. Essay has been quite notorious for me. Attempt 1: 104/200, 2: 046/200 and 3: 140/250.
- To deepen my knowledge of Philosophy in Paper-I and POR. I will have to include C D Sharma in my reading list.
- To make short notes of all the topics
- Periodic revision and answer writing practice

Timeline:

June 25-30: POR
July: IP & WP
After Prelims: SPP

Reading List:

1. Class and Printed notes of Patanjali Coaching for Paper-I (except CWP) and Paper-II
2. Class notes of CWP of Ignited Minds
3. IP- 1) Dutta Chatterjee 2) C D Sharma
4. WP- Y. Masih
5. To supplement SPP notes from Internet

Lets see how it materializes this time.

The Third Attempt

The euphoria of selection in second attempt soon gave way to the dysphoria by realization that I have to write the exam again. In between, came RAS Mains in June and my marriage in July. In August, I served my notice period at RBI. So effectively I started preparing for Mains from September 2013. 90 Days to go!!

In philosophy, this time I thought to deal with Contemporary Western Philosophy (CWP). I came across CWP classes at Ignited Minds by Amit Kumar sir. He taught in Hindi but it wasn't a problem for me. I can understand Hindi well and sir made it a point to say technical words in English also. I must say that sir taught CWP extremely well. It took around 15-20 days to complete this module. I completed Y Masih for WP and Dutta Chatterjee for IP. But I couldn't consolidate my learning because of my casualness and laziness. There was a last time rush and as usual the casualty was Philosophy of Religion. Completed (!!) it in 2 days. 

This was going to cost me dearly in my paper.

On the Exam day:

Paper-I: Most of the Questions were 'critically evaluate' types. As I didn't revise I couldn't properly answer simple questions like Ramanujacharya's saptanupapatti and 2-3 questions of WP. Dejected !!

Paper-II: As always, got overwhelmed by questions in Social-Political Philosophy (SPP). Knew so much so wrote more than necessary. Devoted 2 hrs 15 mins to SPP. Panicked !! Tried to answer the questions of Philosophy of Religion (POR) in a hurry and in short notes format. Paper over. Double dejected !!

Result:

Cleared Mains. Made it to the final list with AIR 149. Happy but dejected !! Have to write exam one more time :( :(

Marks:
Written Total: 663
                      Essay: 140
                      GS: 76, 69, 77, 97
                      Philosophy I: 98, II: 106
Interview: Alka Sirohi ruined me. Only 165. 

Conclusion:
- I have maintained a constant overall score in Philosophy: 40%. (Last: 242/600). 
- Score in Paper-I could be augmented by a minimum of 25 more marks. Needs more efforts, a deeper understanding and REVISION !! 
- Score in Paper-II could be increased by at least 10-15 marks. POR needs its due share of time and efforts. Good answers in SPP do fetch us good marks !!

"Itni shakti humein dena daataa, mann ka vishwas kamzor ho na"