Kasturi Panda, AIR-67 CSE-22 Prelims, Mains & Interview

Hi All,

This is the 9th Topper Journey & Strategy post from the Batch of 2023. Kasturi Panda cleared CSE-22 with AIR-67 in her 2nd attempt. She is already into Odisha Administrative Services on basis of 2021 Exam where she secured Rank-14. Following is her strategy for Prelims, Mains and Interview in her own words:

I am blessed and grateful beyond words for everyone who was part of my journey, blessed me, supported me and prayed for me. I thank the Universe from the core of my heart to have let me to live my dream.

First things first, it’s a pleasure to write for Mudit Jain Sir’s blog. I am thankful for this opportunity to be able to share my story with the community.

Introduction

Hello All,

I am Kasturi Panda. I come from an engineering background. Brought up in the state of Odisha, I finished my BTech Computer Science in 2019 from NIT Rourkela.

My proper preparation for UPSC started only after I finished my graduation. This was my 2^nd attempt in UPSC – 2022. My first attempt was in 2020 when I reached the personality test round. In 2021, I skipped UPSC and appeared OPSC (my state civil services exam) to achieve OAS Rank 14.

Things happen when they have to happen and 23 May, 2023 proved to be my lucky day that gave me AIR 67, UPSC 2022!

My preparation timeline has been for about 4 years. I will share my UPSC journey through a general chronology.

You can contact Kasturi at her Telegram Channel and Instagram Profile

How to Start for UPSC

Determination – I believe gathering the courage to prepare for this exam full fledged is half the work done. If you have decided for preparing and appearing, perhaps you possess the courage of among the most courageous people on earth. If you keep the mindset high, it gradually becomes bearable to handle your low days.
Smart Work – Limit your resources. Try not to use multiple basic books for one subject. Value Addition Materials may go up with time.
Patience – A general cliché, it’s not a 100m race but a marathon 😉So prioritise both your physical and mental health!

First Principles

C or D – This is a million dollar question every aspirant faces. Should I shift to Delhi or should choose to prepare from the comfort of my home. A lot of advice has been given by past toppers on this. Check for the pros and cons. Delhi will provide for a great ecosystem but life becomes difficult. I prioritised self-study over competition and hence, I decided classroom coaching will not suit my strategy.
Optional – I took a lot of time to decide what do I choose as my optional. Computer Science is not offered by UPSC and the next best was Mathematics. However, since I wanted to prepare myself, it was a pragmatic decision to take up a subject whose syllabus is relatively less lengthy. I checked into 11, 12 NCERTs and syllabus of general humanities optionals available. I found sociology more interesting.
NB – My strategy will only make sense to you if your preparation is completely from home and use of online resources suits you. It’s a request to not follow my strategy if you don’t find it relatable.

General Strategy

I did a thorough research about how to prepare, when to prepare and where to prepare. After reading multiple topper’s blogs and strategies, I made a list of all basic books with other resources I need to cover.
For GS, it was a comprehensive approach to cover the basic syllabus first based on UPSC’s official notification. Basic sociology’s conceptual understanding also came in this phase.
Predominantly, my booklist was based on Anudeep Durishetty Sir’s (AIR 1 UPSC 2017) approach for GS and Anu Kumari Mam’s (AIR 2 UPSC 2017) booklist for Sociology.
The basic preparation process longed for about 7-8 months starting from July 2019 to February 2020. I took help from Insights Subject Wise Prelims Test Series for revision and better memory retention of the content I was preparing.

Prelims

As a general advice, it’s wise to devote about 2.5-3 months for specific prelims preparation. For me, during 2020 attempt it started from March 2020. Prelims is the phase that is the most competitive, and more importantly it is meant for elimination. I personally found it more challenging than mains.
My preparation for prelims was very detailed and exhaustive. Thanks to it that I cleared this phase safely above the Gen cut-off both the times.
My strategy was – Revise the basic books multiple (8-10) times or as many times as possible. This has no alternative. Basics give us the perfection over concepts that can be extensively used for intelligent guessing of wrong options. Initially, I had planned to attempt about 30 FLTs (apart from Insights Subject Wise Tests). Then came COVID and prelims was postponed by 4 months. So till I appeared real prelims I practiced about 50-55 FLTs from multiple coaching brands like – Vision, Forum, Shankar, Rau, IasBaba etc. I downloaded them from www.freeupscmaterials.com
I would like to mention that even after doing the above, I was not confident about clearing pre. In fact no amount of preparation gives full confidence to an aspirant. The key is to have faith on the D-Day. Go with an open mind and tell yourself you are the best. Irrespective of the level of questions, I always told myself – “If I’m unable to find answers, no one else will”.
All mock FLTs, I appeared in 2 hours exam simulation environment (without AC and with OMR sheet). I used to analyse my wrong answers and made notes in A4 sheets about all new relevant information I felt worth remembering.
My approach to solving the MCQs – I did it in three phases. In the first phase, I took about 50-55 mins to identify questions that I know the exact correct answers (the easy ones) to as well as the ones in which I could eliminate two options. Reason behind this was it’s natural to get inclined to an option if you’re confused between two. Even if I come back to them in the next phase, it’s unlikely that I will change my mind.
In the second phase, I tried to solve questions of which I could eliminate only one option. This took about 25-30 mins. In the meantime, I also kept few minutes aside to darken the OMR circles phase by phase.
The third phase was not compulsory for me. After experimenting a lot in mock FLTs, I chose a same number of 92-94 questions for myself. I scored high when I attempt these many. Based on the number of questions already attempted in previous two phases, I take up most difficult questions (of which I had no remote knowledge) in multiples of four. Logic is inspired from Kanishak Kataria Sir’s blog. Based on probability, even if I get one of them correct, at least I get zero and no negative.
A piece of advice – Keep all your senses open when you choose your easy questions. It’s likely that they’re easy for most well-prepared aspirants. If we lose on these, it will cost us dearly, we are out of the race.
I had adopted a similar strategy in my 2022 prelims as well but unlike 2020, I used 2.5 months to appear about 30 FLTs.

Join here for free guidance from Mudit Jain, IRS CSE-17 (IPS CSE-14 & 15), Author of Decode Civils – Philosophical Essay Writing, Decode GS2, Decode Ethics 4.0 & Decode History Books

Ethics book referred by CSE 22 Toppers: AIR –76, 91, 176, 189, 249, 288, 297, 299, 326, 356, 476, 541, 611, 616, 700, 737, 739, 746 & others

History book referred by CSE 21 Toppers: AIR – 44, 212, 572, 653 & others

Sample PDFs of Books: Decode Civils – Philosophical Essay Writing, Decode Ethics 4th Edition, Decode GS2 & Decode History

Slideshow of References from Decode Ethics 4th Edition of 9 out of 13 Section-A Questions of 2023 CSE Ethics Paper:

Mains

I started answer writing practice first when 2020 prelims was postponed and we got some extra time. Initially I used PYQs and IasBaba TLP questions. But this exercise was very limited.
During the covid period I had also joined the NICE IAS Sociology Test Series by Praveen Kishore Sir. This was the phase I started making notes for Sociology from post-test explanation videos.
Initially, I was unable to understand the way humanities answers are written. So I downloaded multiple topper mock copies from Vision and Forum websites.
Real practice of answer writing started post prelims. I enrolled for a month-long checking program by http://www.ias.network. Gradually, as I got a hang of the process, I enrolled in ForumIAS MGP+ (includes essay) 2020.
For GS in 2022 I enrolled in Vision Mains Test series (set of 8 FLTs). I also wrote the Forum Simulator Test 2022 (without checking) for final practice before mains 2022.
I used the solutions content and other value addition materials (shared on list on my telegram channel) to make sheets of data, facts, examples, maps and diagrams that facilitated easy revision – paper wise. For ethics also, I made a repository of keywords and examples that I could use, in A4 sheets.
For sociology 2020, there was no FLT in NICE IAS program. So, I also enrolled for set of four sociology FLT (two for each paper) from Vision IAS website. However, due to paucity of time I attempted only two.
For Sociology 2022, I attempted six FLTs (three for each paper) in 3 hours exam like conditions by enrolling to Reliable and Valid Test Series.

Mains Improvement

In 2020, lot of my mains preparation became half-hazard due to lack of mentorship added to covid. Hence, apart from GS4, I had no high scoring paper. Also, my Sociology Paper 2 marks were very poor.
I skipped 2021 UPSC and focused on improving Sociology. I enrolled for IASBABA Sociology Test Series by Vamshi Krishna Sir (now he is associated with unacademy). Value addition materials provided with the tests helped in a lot in enriching my content.
For my 2022 attempt, I thoroughly analysed PYQs and tried to understand UPSC’s art of question setting. You can realise that for each subject there are certain themes which keep getting repeated.
To identify these themes, Mrunal Sir’s free special classes where he analyses PYQs and provides content for each paper was helpful. I made detailed notes from these videos to understand the demand of each question.
By the end, I had notes for each paper’s sub-headings and related content of 1-2 pages. This strategy was same for both GS and Optional. GS notes were runny and I preferred books for revision. But for sociology, I made detailed notes and revised only them (not books) before real mains.
For essay also, I read many topper’s strategies to understand different formats. I printed the quotes compilation from Anudeep Sir’s book. However, in introduction I used anecdotes in both the essays and remembered specific phrases that I sprinkled within body part of the essays.
I had also compiled a set of some generic conclusions that can be put into certain questions, like catchy slogans from Hon’ble Prime Minister (Sabka Saath Sabka Vikas, AtmaNirbhar Bharat) or SDG Goals (remembered all 14 by an abbreviation – PHHE WWEEII CCMT JI).

Personality Test

This is the most relaxing phase in the UPSC exam cycle. After filling the DAF, I dived deep into the keywords I must have a solid preparation on – my background, state and hobbies.
In 2020, my interview was quite factual and subsequent questions having no relation to previous ones.
In 2022, I had a great conversation with the panel and most questions derived from my previous answers that allowed me to stay confident throughout.

LET’S STAY CONNECTED

I have covered few basics of my preparation above but will also share few strategy sessions soon through different channels to cover other general questions that aspirants have in mind.

I am sharing my marksheet, booklist, notes, and mock test copies on my telegram channel

DISCLAIMER – Notes will only provide you an idea about my preparation strategy and you may adopt a similar one if it suits you. Kindly, do not use them as replacement of your own notes and books.

If you have questions or you think I have missed out on anything, please follow and reach out at my Instagram Profile

I’m eagerly waiting for a day when another average aspirant like me enters the holy PDF who might have benefitted from my resources.

BEST REGARDS.

HAVE A NICE DAY!

CSE-22 Topper Strategies:

1) Dwij Goel AIR-71 Journey & GS-2 124 Marks & His Anthropology Strategy 315 Marks

2) Gautam Vivekanandan AIR-211 Essay Topper 149 Marks

3) Khushboo Oberoi AIR-139 Prelims, Ethics & Public Administration 294 Marks

4) Aaditya Sharma AIR-70 Prelims, Mains & Medical Science

5) Abhishek Dawachya AIR-610 Prelims, Mains (GS-1 Topper) & Sociology

6) Avinash Kumar AIR-17 Philosophy Topper 319 Marks

7) Virendra Kumar Meena AIR-883 Hindi Medium Cleared Prelims Thrice