The UPSC CSAT – Civil Service Aptitude Test
The UPSC CSAT – Civil Service Aptitude Test – also known as the preliminary exam and a prelude to the main papers, has caused a lot of distress in the past few years. With ups and downs and rather frequent changes, since the establishment of the UPSC CSAT in 2011, there have been many a criticism – the most major being that the paper that year was advantageous to candidates with a strong base in Hindi and English over other regional dialects.
This unrest caused a significant change in the paper this year – that is in 2015 – where the UPSC
re-evaluated their rules and regulations and stated that the first of the two papers of the UPSC CSAT will only be a qualifying paper; not having any bearing on the merit ranking and requiring only 33% to qualify for the mains. This paper is the general studies exam, looking broadly at the candidates knowledge of historical and cultural background, economic, political, environmental and social issues, science, technology, basic geography and last but not the least – current affairs.
Though this paper is only qualifying, it is strongly recommended that the candidate prepares very well for the UPSC CSAT Paper I as that is the paper which covers the subjects that are looked into in detail in the main exams. Giving a little extra time to the course of this exam can simplify your studying strategy for the next round greatly.
A detailed analysis of the past four years of CSAT papers has shown a considerable leaning towards History and Culture questions as well as ones on Polity and the environment, while Geography is given comparatively less weightage. While this does not give a certain prediction in any way, when you are stuck for time you know which way to spend your extra minutes!
This puts a lot of pressure on the second paper of the UPSC CSAT – the general abilities test – that evaluates the candidates reasoning, logical and rational problem solving abilities, communication skills, interpersonal expertise, basic numeracy and comprehension in both English and Hindi.
The general abilities section of the UPSC CSAT of the past four years is seen to have given great importance to English and Hindi Comprehension, followed closely by numerical questions and questions to test the candidate’s general mental ability. While the questions regarding problem solving and decision making have been held to a minimum, they are made up for by the rising weightage of Analytical and Logical Reasoning parts of the paper. The segments pertaining to just English Language skills have been made in accordance to 10th class level examinations, and the number of questions too have been kept few so as to not have the candidate’s mother tongue influence his or her qualification and rank.
Both papers are equally marked – maximum 200 marks each – with the first having a 100 questions and the second 80. Each lasts a total of two hours, and all the questions are multiple choice – so make sure you mark the right answers and check them ones right at the end.
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