Hi All,

At a young age of 22, Mridul Shivhare cleared UPSC CSE-21 with AIR-247 in his very 1st attempt. Following is his strategy in his own words:

Hello friends, I am Mridul Shivhare. I secured AIR 247 in UPSC CSE-2021. I am very fortunate to clear this exam in my 1st attempt at the age of 22. I belong to Datia district of MP. I am a BA graduate from Devi ahilya Vishwavidyala Indore.

You can contact me anytime at My Telegram, Instagram Profile or Facebook

Through this blog, I would like to share my strategy with respect to CSE preparation. I would like to give some “GOLDEN advice” for Aspirants:

1. Read the syllabus thoroughly–Each & every point & topic mentioned in syllabus.
2. Read, write & Revise Previous year questions again & again–For prelims from 2001 & for mains from 2013.
3. Have due faith & complete “TRUST” in yourself, your material, your mentors etc.
4. Read less, think more, revise more and write more.
5. For consistent motivation, you just answer 2 questions by yourself–Why do you want to become an IAS officer? “What max can happen?”–Life is much bigger than civil services. Take CSE as part of life and not make it your life. If you succeed in answering these questions constantly, you will clear the exam as early as possible.
6. Maintain good Physical & Mental health–As i was ill during the entire process. So i can well understand the importance of health in this exam.

Now i would like to share my strategy for the 3 stages of this exam–

Prelims exam

1. First refer to all PYQs in last 12 years atleast. You will find that the number of questions are fixed from different subjects. Ex– Polity (16-18 questions), Economy (16-18 questions), Environment (18-22 questions), Modern history (10-12 questions), Ancient + Medieval + Culture (8-10 questions), Geography (5-6 questions) and Rest 20 to 25 questions are from Science & Tech, International organisations, some current affairs or miscellaneous questions.
2. For Polity, Economy & Modern history there are certain guaranteed sources available and these covers about 40 to 45 questions. Polity–Laxmikant + 11th NCERT. Economy–Mrunal Sir’s notes + His Win CSP series. Modern history–Spectrum + Bipan chandra book. So, during your preparation make sure that your accuracy should be about 95% in these subjects. They will enable you to fetch about 65 to 70 marks (If your accuracy is very good).

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3. Than I focussed on other subjects in the order as mentioned below (with the sources which i followed)
   • Environment–As compared to Coaching institutes which teaches theoretical parts of Env, UPSC is more interested in fixed 6-7 topics and they repeatedly asks questions from those topics only. These topics are–
     1. There are about 10-12 Acts like WPA 1972, EPA 1986, Air act etc. UPSC asks internal details of these acts. Ex–Critical wildlife habitat is under which act
     2. Bodies like National biodiversity authority, NTCA etc–who is its chairman, whether body if statutory or not, under which act it has been established etc
     3. International conventions
     4. Certain keywords mentioned in news like Greenwashing, climate action tracker, Miyawaki etc
     5. Global Reports and indices
     6. Locations like Tiger reserves, Biosphere reserves, wildlife sanctuaries–You have to go in details of them like state, which rivers passes through, any special species found etc
     7. Pollution
     8. Climate change

My sources for Environment–

1. My own notes of about 20 pages only on above 3 topics
2. Vision IAS PT 365, Rau’s prelims compass, insights PT Exclusive
3. Common sense

• Medieval history— I have prepared notes in 30 pages which covers Satish chandra book, Tamil nadu book, New NCERT, PYQs till now + refer to a Keyword PDF by MK Yadav sir.
• Ancient history— I read RS sharma NCERT book only.
• Art & culture– Do read only following topics from any thin PDF you can find in market
  1. Bhakti & Sufi movement
  2. Paintings
  3. Architecture
  4. Dance & music
  5. Locations in ancient & medieval history + their present locations
  6. Jainism, Buddhism
  7. Indian Philosophies
  8. See the current affairs news from Visions’s PT 365
• Geography– I have done only following topics
  1. Physical Geography–Only do topics like Cyclones, El nino & La nina, Winds + their effects, ocean currents, salinity etc (In short only some hot topics of Climatology & oceanography in detail)
  2. Details of locational geography like Rivers (Origin, mouth, tributories, states, Dams, Any tiger reseves or national parks, waterfalls)
  3. World geography–World climatic zones (Answer of this question usually remains equatorial climate☺️), famous lakes, rivers, mountains etc + keep track on places in news.
  4. Read about locations of Minerals in india
  5. Read about Conditions required for different crops.
• Current affairs– I read current affairs Only for Economy & environment from Vision PT 365, Rau’s compass, Insights PT exclusive, Mrunal sir’s win CSP

ALTHOUGH one should also read current affairs for science & tech also.

• Apart from these read certain PDFs which i will share in my telegram channel. You will get about 5 to 8 questions from those PDFs.

What about Mock tests for prelims?

Actually i have more faith on UPSC previous year question than any coaching mock papers, so i have done PYQs 5-6 times but had not done any Coaching mock papers.

But i have no grudges against coachings, so you can go for solving their Mock tests.

• I would recommend the community to go through about 10 videos of forum IAS on youtube about catches & tricks in PYQs. Their research document on PYQs is also available in market.

How to solve Prelims paper?

• First identify 45 to 50 questions which are from your zone (Books like Laxmikant, Mrunal sir notes, spectrum etc)
• Than go for elimination, catching the keywords, tricks etc which you will learn by solving PYQs agains & again.

Mains exam

This, i would say is the only certain stage in entire process. It is the most reliable stage also which will help you select, as it helped me.

For entire topics & points mentioned in mains syllabus i have made very detailed, comprehensive, well researched notes from different authentic sources.

They have entire value addition an aspirant needs to fetch high marks in mains.

This i can say by the evidence as i scored 807 marks in mains, even after leaving questions worth about 150 marks due to my bad health. Also they were used by many of my friend who also got very high marks in mains.

They contains value additions like–

1. Very practical points, solutions
2. Case studies (National, International & regional) & Examples like Yantradoot model, Women sarpanch like Fatima bi & Sushma badhu etc
3. Key words like DNA approach (Dialogue, negotiation, action), Transformative constitutionalism, Regulatory cholestrol, WHAM approach, PEPTIC approach etc
4. Relevant reports, indices & facts under various topcis
5. Relevant committee recommendations under various topics. Ex–S. Vijay kumar committee on NGOs, 2nd ARC, Niti aayog recommendations, Manishankar aiyar comittee on PRIs efc
6. Relevant Supreme court judgements under various topics.
7. Interlinking of ideas & philosophies with syllabus. Ex–linking idea of Welfare state, SDGs, DPSPs, Preamble, FRs, FDs with topics like Land reforms, NGOs, SHGs, Naxalism, Poverty, Hunger, PRIs, women etc

As I have been helped by many seniors, toppers & officers, so I feel it is my turn to help aspirants in any way I could.

The most important way in which i can help the Aspirants Community is by sharing my crisp, detailed & very practical notes on each & every topic mentioned in syllabus.

These notes are the work of about 2.5 years of my preparation. I constantly updated and modified them to better cover all the topics in the syllabus.

Please do read 2-3 topics and you will feel the difference.

For this do follow my telegram channel named Mridul shivhare AIR 247, as you will get everything there. 

What to do with these notes??

In my opinion, one thing is “Information” and other thing is “USE VALUE OF THAT INFORMATION”.

So these notes can provide you good information, you just have to learn how to use them, you have to learn how to inter link one idea with other and how to use one information in different answers.

This can be learnt by writting PYQs again and again

PSIR optional

As i have done PSIR foundation classes by Shubra ranjan mam, so i have done my basics from Mam’s notes only.

Paper 1 part A

For this i relied solely on Mam’s notes & writting PYQs.

Paper 1 part A, Paper 2A & 2B

After doing basic concepts & theories from mam’s notes, i made my own notes by taking reference of various sources like–

1. Oxford IGP book by Pratap bhanu mehta
2. Fadia & Fadia
3. Added articles & books of about last 7-8 years on relevant topics in syllabus with name of scholars.
4. I have inter linked theories with cuurent relevence in IR. Ex–Realism with Chinese galwan aggression, Shift in balance of power in Indo pacific etc.
5. For this i have written the summary of different books with their titles & scholars. Also i have written names of articles & their authors which comes in The hindu, Indian express , ORF etc.

So i feels that after doing your basics from Mam’s notes, you can read my notes on Paper 1A, 2A, 2B.

Because it is these value added notes only which enabled me to fetch 267 in PSIR, even after leaving questions worth about 50 marks.

Thank you all. I wish you All the best & hope that all of you will succeed with flying colours in this exam.

Feel free to reach me for any further help

You can contact me anytime at My Telegram, Email, Instagram Profile or Facebook

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• Sparsh Verma (AIR-644, CSE-21) Prelims Strategy
• Nivedita R (AIR-572, CSE-21) Strategy
• Anna Sinha (AIR-112, CSE-21) Strategy
• Pankaj Gujar (AIR-423, CSE 21) Working Professional Strategy
• Hiren Barot (AIR-332, CSE-21) GS & Sociology Strategy
• Antriksh Jain (AIR-130, CSE-21) Sociology Strategy
• Keshav Gupta, AIR- 439 CSE-21 Economics Strategy
• Dilip K Kainikkara (AIR-21, CSE-21) Maths Strategy