History Optional - Maps Question Strategy by Gaurav Gupta AIr - 117 UPSC Civils

Map Question Strategy: History Optional ( Reblogged from Gaurav Gupta's Blog )

Importance

• Very Important question – 60 marks/20 locations
• Objective and to-the-point answer
• Highly scoring gives edge over other optionals such as Psychology, Political Science etc
• If you have prepared well then would save time for other questions


1. Strategy is to divide the time domain into various phases
2. One should be aware of different names for same time phase (Indus Valley Civilization also known as Chalcolithic period/Copper Age and Bronze Age) as sometimes UPSC may ask in a round-about way.
3. Make your reference maps with great accuracy so that you may revise it later.

• Pre-historic - Paleolithic , Mesolithic, Neolithic 
• Harappan Civilization/Bronze Age
• Mahajanpada Period (Later Vedic Age)
• Mauryan Period
• Early Ancient Historical period
• Gupta Age

Remembering and Practice Tips –
 Always practice on blank map (as this is what you will get in the exam)
 Take reference from –
 International and national boundaries
 Key inflection points on the boundary
 Key Rivers
 Tropical line, longitude and latitude referencing
 Key locations – such as capitals of state
 But Don’t depend too much on reference cities and rivers – as they are not given in the exam

 Make short notes about those locations at one place for those locations behind the map, which would help you in remembering key features of that.
 Give more importance to pre-historic, early historic, ancient, early medieval and medieval sites in decreasing order.

Sample Map: Mauryan Era sites
 You can differentiate between different types of edicts during Mauryan era using different symbols.
 Idea is to have clarity on the map to revise it later so use extended lines wherever required to write its name etc.

The above article has been reblogged from the blog written by Gaurav Gupta , please ask any question you might have this article on the link of his original article, for that Click Here .

History Optional Strategy by Surabhi Malik AIR 52 UPSC Civils

Strategy for History Optional by Surabhi Malik, IAS ( Reblogged from a facebook link )

This is a subject where strategising becomes paramount; since the expanse of the syllabus itself appears insurmountable. Since you are preparing for exam purposes here and your primary objective is not, presumably, the 'love of learning' , it becomes important to begin, as I like to put it, backwards.
It's best to analyse the question papers spanning at least a decade; questions before that are too simplistic to have a fair chance of appearing in the same form again. So, I would suggest compartmentalising questions based on chronology. That gives us a fairly expansive scale of topics to focus on. Second, when preparing a particular topic from a book or notes, it's important to cover it in entirety-- i.e. think of all possible aspects of a situation that you can be questioned on. Apart from facts, focus on 'whys'-- why civilisations crumbled, how different was their end to another's end.

'How' religious policies contributed to administration, art and architecture. Focus on analytical questions, but be clear about facts. Only when there is clarity of facts relating to different periods can you handle a question that seeks to highlight the differences and similarities therein. You must be clear in your head what the basic differences between different civilisations are. This suggests a panoramic view of history along with some microscopic treatment. Last year, there were some descriptive questions like Khilji's market reforms, etc-- and these are very standard questions that serve as bonus for an exam-taker. Don't be caught off-guard on such questions.

For books, I began with 'Modern India' by Bipin Chandra, supplemented by 'India's struggle for Independence' by Bipin Chandra, Mukherjee, Panikkar. Spectrum's book on Modern India that people use for the prelims is also a storehouse of facts! For Ancient India, I referred to 'Ancient India' by R.S. Sharma (a wonderfully concise book where every single word is important) and supplemented sparsely by 'The Wonder that was India' by A.L. Basham. Romila Thapar's treatment of 'Ashoka' is venerated in Indian historiography. For Medieval India, I found Satish Chandra's two volumes on Medieval India quite sufficient.
Apart from this, another famous standard text is 'An Advanced History of India' by Majumdar, Raychaudhuri and Dutta.
Personally, I got some history notes from Mr. Hemant Jha in Delhi. I found them very useful for filling in important gaps in my knowledge. He covers different aspects of topics and questions remarkably well, with regard to extra information and facts. Be aware though, you should be reading standard texts for improving your answer-writing abilities.

As a part of my strategy, I covered the Indian History very exhaustively and was a little selective for World History. I do not necessarily recommend this, since it is generally thought that the questions on World History are more straightforward than questions on Modern India. I did so because my comfort level with Indian History was greater and I felt confident of being able to tackle tricky questions. In my selective studies on World History, i followed Mr. Hemant Jha's notes as well as 'Modern World' by K. Krishna Reddy. There are other better books, you should google and look some of those up. I focussed on European History and the Revolutions in particular as I saw a repetition of questions in these topics.

For Map, there are books available in the market with a large number of map sites and I'm afraid there's no short cut there. You really have to learn to mark all of them on the map and learn atleast 3 things about each place.

Finally, remember to set targets and achieve daily goals! Anything left over tends to add up dangerously in History. Remember you will be writing 4-5 page answers, and when you have covered an 'aspect' of a question that satisfies that word limit, move on. You're not here to do specialised research on one particular area. While answering questions, your introduction and conclusion should be impressive. While I personally used my introduction to explain the setting and context of the question, I used my conclusion to summarise my answer and place into perspective the direction that my answer took. Make sure it's insightful; that's half the battle won!

All the best to everyone!

History Optional Strategy by Gaurav Gupta AIR - 117 UPSC Civils

History as optional –

First of all one should take optional based on his interest as this subject is you would be reading for next 1-2 years or more so you must have zeal to go deeper, read new books by new writers to learn and understand various perspectives. And that is why I took History as optional despite being told by some people that it is not ‘scoring’, or it has ‘large syllabus’. However once I decided, I made sure that I should not get such thoughts. In UPSC all subjects are scoring provided you are answering what is asked.

Other benefits of History as optional (once you have decided that you have interest in it) –

I take history as very scientific, analytical and objective subject as you have to frame your answer based on historical evidences/facts and records.
I liked to read about how was our past and it is always fascinating to know how the older world used to live.
Also History as optional helps a lot in GS Paper-I (as modern history comes in GS-1+60% of world history comes in GS-1+parts of ancient and medieval history comes as culture and it is also very helping in scoring good in paper-I of Prelims.
It gives you material to talk about many things, many socio-political-economic issues and also to write about.

Preparation Strategy:

For history, I was almost dependent on self-study only except that I got few notes from my coaching for world history as it was part of GS-Paper-I and given some books to read by my Prof as supplementary material.
I decided that I would stick to few text books/source and would read them from end to end and then would not be distracted by many other books which may also be good but would reduce my focus from other parts of course.
I made self-made written notes for all parts of history – Ancient, Medieval, Modern and world as in history there are so many facts, names, years etc which you may have to remember to incorporate in your answers and after reading so much one may feel before examination that one is forgetting everything !! (It happens and then you loose sleep before the exam day) So these notes really help you revise faster and gives feeling of completion if you have revised them 1-2 times before exam (This was one of the weakness during my first attempt).
Then I made sure that I do  not leave any topic mentioned in the History syllabus and so when I found that I have not enough information/data/knowledge about any topic from books then I referred to online sources/Britannica encyclopedia / supplementary books to read about them and note important points from them.
I went through every question of last 20 years and tried many questions by writing also – this has three benefits, a) It gave boost to my confidence, b) as History is static subject so certain topics/questions/issues can be repeated so you will have already structured answer, c) You will find certain loopholes in your preparation, certain things which you might have missed and not covered.

Main Text Books –

Upinder Singh (Ancient and Early Medieval India), (VERY GOOD BOOK) – has many maps, pictures, latest findings, different point of views and gender perspective

Salma Ahmed Farooqui (Comprehensive History of Medieval India) and Old NCERT Medieval India book

Bipin Chandra (Modern India) + Coaching Notes

Word History – Coaching Notes (HAD GOOD NOTES SO DID NOT REFER TO BOOK) and also referred to xerox notes of world history by Rau classes (Delhi) from my friend and found them quite good.

Supplementary sources –

India After Gandhi by Ramchandra Guha
Spectrum Modern India History
Mastering Modern World History by Norman Lowe
Spectrum Culture Book
India After Independence by Bipin Chandra (found very biased however)
india.gov.in
Online Britannica encyclopedia
India by John Keay
Watched episodes of “Bharat ek Khoj” on youtube
New pattern and my opinion

I found this year paper a bit different that previous year questions. History First paper was interesting, the questions required deep understanding and the ability to frame the answer by combining various parts which are scattered here and there in the books. So reading analytically is must. Now the pattern demand understanding of concepts, connecting the dots – interconnection between social issues, economic issues, gender issues from historical perspective and there must not be too much focus on mastering years of wars/political lineage and succession of kingdoms — now those questions are not being asked.
You should have very strong hold on one part of each paper, for example I had strong hold on ancient India in first paper and Modern India in second paper and good amount of strong hold in world history too. This can help in choosing which questions to select and answer.
Try to give archaeological findings and their example in your answer to support your argument.
Also try to include latest findings in your answer (for example I included latest finding based on DNA analysis on caste structure history in ancient India in one of my answer.)

Writing Strategy

I followed introduction-main body with headings/sub-headings-conclusion format in writing long answers (15/20 number). For compulsory question I tried to write very objectively in short paragraph format.
I tried to attempt question 1 and 5 (compulsory) in the last else one has tendency to write more in 12 marks question and fixed that I should have 45-60 min at least for these questions to write in the last.
I got 114 (225 marks attempted) in Paper-I and 125 in (all questions attempted) in Paper-2. I however noticed that even in my this attempt at various points in some questions I did not focus on core of the answer and included some unwarranted parts in my answers thus digressing and due to which main answer was small so I hope future aspirants don;t repeat this mistake (especially in Paper-I) and try to see what parts have been asked in the question and answer all the parts giving due importance to each part.
There may be some questions which are part of compulsory question of 12 marks each which you don’t know at all. It was the case in first paper where I did not know two of 5 questions so I left them and decided to focus more on those which I know and tried to give more time to map question in place of putting unrelevant answer and fluff such questions to get 2-4 marks or even 0 marks as those who are checking answer scripts must be knowledgeable in their field and subject and we cannot make them fool. This is my opinion and I know many try to write something even if they know nothing and I found then getting not selected also.

Map practice and strategy 

I referred this book for maps-Spectrum’s Historical Atlas (with key places)
I found above book useful but it has majority of locations from medieval India and modern India perspective however in recent times the focus of UPSC in history has shifted to pre-historic and ancient Indian sites (paleolithic, neolithic, megalithic, Bronze age etc). For that I found book by Upinder Singh very informative and too good as it has many maps, new locations which have been discovered recently and pictures etc which makes reading history very interesting.
So I divided the locations in a time -scale (pre-historic (paleo/meso/neo-microlithic), historic (mahajanpada age/Mauryan/Early historic/Gupta etc) and then mapped them state-vise in practice maps and made short notes about them listing important features behind the map-paper. (Like – Shortughai in Afghanistan was trading out-post during Indus civilization) — This helped in eleventh hour revision also.
Before one month of exam I practiced the map almost “every day” in the new pattern where UPSC asks to guess the location and then write about it. By dividing the locations based on states in India (and nations – Pak/Afghanistan) it became easier to guess the location else its very confusing when some locations are very near-by.
My wife used to give 15 locations on a map with only dots showing and then I used to solve them. This I did almost every day before 1 month of exam.
One month practice helped me a lot in dealing with map question and I was able to strike 80-90% during practices. Also give more focus to pre-historic, early historic and early medieval sites. Also make sure that you are aware of synonyms of different periods as it may confuse you. (For example: Harappan civilization is also known as bronze age civilization and Vedic age is also known as Iron age etc)
I am attaching some notes I have prepared for some topics of Modern Indian History, however most of my history notes are in written format so it would not be possible to upload them and also I believe it is best to have one’s own notes as every one has his own way to making notes, inferring from that and style of learning.

(Also this is the strategy I followed which may not be best but I found it good and suitable for me, so Please create your own strategy which suits you and your study style. You can take inputs from many people but ultimately you will have to have your own strategy.)


Additional History Notes – Modern India

Indian women freedom fighters 

Khalaji revolution

The above article has been reblogged from the blog written by Gaurav Gupta , please ask any question you might have this article on the link of his original article, for that Click Here .

UPSC CAPF 2014 - Marksheet of Top 5 ranks

UPSC CAPF 2014 Marks of Top 5 Rankers
RANK	Paper 1	Paper 2	Written total	Interview	Total	Name
1	165	95	260	90	350	Rahul Singla
2	145	88	233	110	343	G Chandrashekhar
3	133	88	221	120	341	Akshay Upadhyay
4	146	102	248	90	338	Rahul Rai
5	123	95	218	115	333	Anil Goud

My UPSC CAPF - 2014 Interview Experience - Got recommended with All India Rank 4.

UPSC calls its interview as Personality Test, but don't get too happy, they still do ask factual questions. But what I feel is that they must be carrying lower marks than the opinion based and situation based questions.

I had prepared well for my D day at UPSC and it was on 9th February in morning session at UPSC Bhawan, Dholpur House, New Delhi. At first everyone is made to sit in the big hall with circular dome shaped roof. Here all the documents and forms are checked and then you are told to wait for your interview turn.

I was in for a big surprise on that day, just after the documents were verified, it was around 10:45 a.m. , a portly looking man came and called out my name. He instructed me to follow him, I was very nervous at that point of time and so much was going on inside my head, so without paying much thought I started to follow him. Mid way in our walk, a CISF personnel frisked me. I was wondering why this redundant task was being done, we were already frisked at entry gate.

And then just after that, the person told me to sit outside a room. When I looked on the name plate it said " Chattar Singh ". It was like a covert operation to lead a man into ambush, nobody told me that I am going first for the interview. First day of interview and first show too.

Heartbeat suddenly shot up in anticipation of coming half an hour. To calm myself I tried to distract my mind and started observing people around and it was of great help. Everyone was very casual and chatty on good February morning, observing them certainly relaxed my tensed mind. And then a peon came out and told me to go inside.

Inside their were four people, CS - Chattar Singh ( Chairman of Board ) , M1 - lady , M2 and M3 - both men seemingly from armed forces. They were all seated around a square table. Now the interview questions : ( answers vary from person to person and personal experiences so I am not mentioning them )

CS: Is this you ?? ( after showing me photo of mine )
CS: How do I pronounce your surname ?
CS: You have earlier been employed , please tell about your experience there ?
CS: Why do you want to leave that organisation and come here ?

M1: Why haven't you joined army ? Did you ever apply for it ?
M1: Is there any one in your family who has served in uniformed service ?
M1: Tell me about your home district ?
M1: What are the famous establishments there ?

CS: You have mentioned football, according to you what is impact of ISL on indian football ?
CS: What are the steps needed for betterment of sports culture in India ?
CS: Watching movies is your hobby too, what sort of movies do you watch ?
CS: Why don't you watch Bollywood movies ?
CS: Which genre of movies attracts you the most ?

M2: You seem to have interest in war and history, am I right ?
M2: Please recall the events leading to second world war ?
M2: How is World War 1 related to second world war ?
M2: Any particular military strategy that was used in World War 2 ?
M2: What was the turning point of Second World War ?
M2: Tell me about the outcome of First World War ?

CS: What is your force preference ?
CS: Why have you chosen CISF as first preference ? Why not others / whats wrong with them ?

M3: Are you still in touch with computer science ?
M3: Of what help can be your degree in CAPF ?
M3: Tell me about Data Mining ?
M3: What is Cloud Computing , explain in simple terms ?
M3: Difference between political setup in India and US ?
M3: What is the difference between powers of Indian and US president ?

CS: Why is CISF still required , why can't we replace them with private security ?
CS: Ok, you may go now .

I was expecting at least 100 out of 150. The interview went quite well and the duration was about 25 - 30 minutes. I missed a few points here and there which I should have spoken, but that happens to everyone due to very less time that you have to gather points and prepare your answer. I couldn't defend choosing CISF over others well , maybe nobody can. I ended up arguing a little bit with the chairman over the CISF question after he brought it up again, shouldn't have done that.

Anyways the end result is that I figured in the final merit list with 90 /150 marks in Personality Test.
All's well that ends well. Hope the interview transcript helps you all . 

Central Board of Excise and Customs - State Wise Vacanies SSC CGL 2014

This picture of an RTI is circulating on the internet. It shows vacancies per state for posts of Excise Inspector , Preventive Officer and Examiner to be recruited through SSC CGL 2014 Exam. All three posts come under the Central Board of Excise and Customs.

Which job is better, Commissioned Officer in the Indian Army or Assistant Commandant in CAPFs?

This question is frequently asked by the aspirants who have a passion within them to serve in the Armed Forces of the country. Well here is my take on this topic.

There is no comparison between them as such because primarily one is related to internal and other external security of the country. Even in CAPF you can not compare one force to another , they have different fields of operations. CISF protects industries / establishments , CRPF handles law and order situations , BSF/ ITBP/ SSB are border guarding forces. They have completely different operational scenarios even among them , so the question of comparing in totality with army is naive at the best.

An AC is company commander in all the forces whereas the same is not true about Captain in army. You can not compare a CISF AC with a Army Captain, because CISF operates in units ( not battalions ), where an AC also has lots of decision making power and he may even be the unit commander of smaller units. Whereas in Army, Captains don't get such privileges.
CRPF AC has much more civil policing powers and hence is also not comparable to Army captain. At most BSF / ITBP / SSB AC can be said to be similar to Army Captain in terms of service.
The basic difference is in service conditions and hierarchy, Army is reportedly much more strict in dealing with hierarchy i.e. junior officers have very little breathing space in terms of opinion / decision making etc.

In terms of recruitment profile, Army has lots of entries and inductions, Twice a year NDA and CDS each , then there are TES , UES etc etc.. The focus is more on selection boards rather than written exam. 200 vacancies twice through NDA = 400. 200 vacancies twice through CDS = 400. Only these two entries contribute about 800+ officers. There are other entries also which contribute to officers inducted in a year , with about total inductions being in range of 1500 -2000 per year.
Whereas CAPF AC has only one entry through UPSC once a year, the competition there is lot tougher due to very low number of vacancies around 300 - 400 ( combining all 5 forces ) and presence of civil service aspirants who prefer it as a second option to IPS.

Promotions - AC in all forces have different career progressions as they separate cadres. But generally an AC retires as DIG equivalent Brigadier on pay scale. And ACs who are higher in seniority retire as IG equivalent to Maj General. In BSF , ACs can also become ADG that is one rank higher than IG, but that is rare. Army captains have a very uncertain career profile in comparison , most them retire as Lt. Col and Colonel. Very few reach to the scale of Brigadier and even fewer to the rank of Maj. General. But the good thing is that handful of officers (mostly if one has come through NDA entry) , have a shot however faint but the shot at least at reaching rank of Lt. Gen and General.

In the end it really depends on your own aspirations, your capacity to crack the exam and which uniform you want to see yourself wearing. All of the above forces offer you good service conditions and opportunity to live life in all its glory.

Tentative List of Vacancies SSC CGL 2014 - not sure of authenticity though.

This is the list of Staff Selection Commission Combined Graduate Level 2014 reported vacancies. This vacancy image is making rounds on various forums related to SSC CGL. There is no information about the authenticity of the list. Neither is there any information available about the source of this information. But if this is true then its a good news for the aspirants of this exam. There are a lot of vacancies in sought after departments such as CSS, Customs, Income Tax, Excise etc. Railways, CBI and External Affairs have less vacancies as usual.
Best of luck to all those who are appearing in SSC CGL 2014 Tier 2. 

SSC CGL 2013 Combined Graduate Level Exam Final Result has been Declared !!!

Staff Selection Commission , after a long and arduous waiting period, has declared the final result of SSC CGL 2013 on 13th March 2015.

Cut Off for various post category wise and total number of vacancies for each post can be looked up in the write up issued by SSC. For viewing the write up please - Click Here

List of Selected Candidates and Post allotted :

1. Interview Post - http://ssc.nic.in/press-release/ROL_L1_12_03_2015.pdf

2. Non Interview Post - http://ssc.nic.in/press-release/ROL_L3_12_03_2015.pdf

3. Statistical Investigator / Compiler - http://ssc.nic.in/press-release/ROL_L2_12_03_2015.pdf

Regarding queries for Original RTI - UPSC CAPF

Many aspirants mailed me requesting to upload the original RTI . Seems like everyone is so worried about the authenticity of the info I provided previously. Well guys here is the pic of the RTI. Hope you all are geared up to face the challenge. All the best.

RTI - Latest Vacancy Details of CAPF 2014

I had filed an RTI with UPSC regarding the latest vacancy details of the CAPF 2014 exam. At the time of publishing of the advertisement for the CAPF 2014 , UPSC had stated 136 vacancies overall. There were no vacancies reported in ITBP and SSB. But while filling up the DAF before the physical exam I noticed that in the options regarding the service preference SSB was also listed. So I sensed that the vacancies must have increased. Hence I filed this RTI with UPSC.

The reply came within a month and I am a bit late in sharing this reply with you all due to various preoccupations. Anyways nothing good came out of the reply, contrary to the belief that vacancies will have been increased, reply stated that current number of vacancies stood at 121 only. This is 15 lower than the earlier stated 136 vacancies.

The details of vacancies as given in the RTI are :

Service	SC	ST	OBC	General	Total
CISF	5	3	10	22	40
BSF	4	2	7	15	28
SSB	3	1	6	15	25
CRPF	4	2	8	14	28
Total	16	8	31	66	121

UPSC called 720 candidates for the Physical Standard Test + Medical Tests.  That means in 1:6 with the number of vacancies.

Best of luck to all those who have qualified for the interview.

Tentative Exam Calendar IBPS / Pattern Changed for PO Exam !!!!

At last IBPS has decided to do something about the falling standard of PO exams conducted by it. In a surprising move IBPS has decided to conduct 2 Tier exam which I suppose will be just like SSC CGL exam. The candidates will be filtered in two stages for the interview , the stages are prelims and mains. The candidates who qualify prelims will be eligible to appear for the mains exam and those shortlisted afterwards will appear for interview. The marks of prelim exam will not be counted in overall merit. Candidates will have have to apply only once for the registration of both prelims and mains i.e. no separate registration will be done. This seems to be a good move as it will certainly raise the level of the Probationary Officer exam. Ww will have to wait for a few months to see how IBPS will be conducting the exams.

I am pasting the important excerpts from the website of IBPS here. Please make sure you visit the IBPS website regularly for latest news and information regarding any change in the dates and pattern as they are always subject to be changed by giving due notice.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

CWE RRB-IV – Recruitment of Officers Scales I, II & III and Office Assistants
There will be single examination for each of these cadres and the tentative dates are as follows:
RRBs CWE-IV 05.09.2015, 06.09.2015, 12.09.2015, 13.09.2015, 19.09.2015, 20.09.2015, 6.09.2015 & 27.09.2015

PSBs – CWE PO/MT-V and CWE CLERK-V
It has been decided by the competent authority to hold two-tier examinations for recruitment of PO/MT and Clerks from CWE-V onwards. All the candidates who successfully register themselves under CWE PO/MT-V and CWE CLERK-V will be called for Preliminary Examinations. Based on the performance in the preliminary examination, certain number of candidates will be shortlisted for each of these examinations. The short listed candidates will then be called for Main Examinations. There will be fewer number of questions in the Preliminary Examination with shorter duration. The details with regard to both the Preliminary and Main examinations will be made available on IBPS website through the detailed notifications in due course.
The marks obtained in the Preliminary examination will not be considered for preparing the final merit list and the marks obtained in the Main Examination will only be considered for short listing for
interview.

The tentative dates are as follows :

CWE PO/MT-V
Preliminary Examination 03.10.2015, 04.10.2015, 10.10.2015 &11.10.2015
Main Examination 31.10.2015

CWE CLERK-V
Preliminary Examination 05.12.2015, 06.12.2015, 12.12.2015, 13.12.2015, 19.12.2015 & 20.12.2015
Main Examination 03.01.2016

PSBs – CWE SPECIALIST-V
There will be single examination and the tentative dates are as follows:
CWE SPECIALIST-V 30.01.2016 & 31.01.2016

Process of Registration
The registration process will be through online mode only and there will be a single registration
for both Preliminary and Main examination, wherever applicable.