Civil Services Examination COMPREHENSIVE strategy

Checklist of 

Prelims Sources 

1. Current affairs — VisionIAS, Insights, or GK Today compilations ...only one; monthly compilations or weekly, do monthly diligently on time.

2. Environment and ecology — Shankar IAS and Environment book by Vaishali Anand and Majid Hussain.

3. Polity — Laxmikant, My notes 

4. Geography — G C Leong, Vajiram notes

5. Economics — Sriram IAS notes, YouTube lectures by Khan academy on macroeconomic, Mrunal lectures.

6. History and Culture — Bipan Chandra books, Nitin Singhania.

7. Science and technology — Mostly current affairs and NCERTs as given below.

8. CSAT — RS Agarwal 

9. Newspaper — read one Hindu or Indianexpress, don’t make notes, use compilations.

10. Notes — make for optional, not needed for other subjects. Focus on answer writing, make checklists and lists of key things to remember.

NCERTs

1. Polity — Class XI Constitution at work 

2. Environment — Class XI Ecology

3. Science — Class 6-10

4. History — Class XI RN Sharma for Ancient, Class XI Medieval, Art and Culture Fine arts book class XI, Living craft traditions Class XI

5. Sociology — Class XII Indian society, Class XI Intro to Socio.

6. Geography — Class XI Physical Geography 

7. Economics — Class XI Indian Economic Development, Class XII Introductory Macroeconomics and Microeconomics. 

Mocks

1. Last 25 years UPSC prelims papers — but careful about solutions, many answers are wrong; available on Amazon.

A. First do subject wise, then whole tests in last 3-4 months or after you feel you have covered 100 percent of syllabus.

2. Insights and Vision test series for prelims — get enrolled in one and other one get from market and study 

3. Optional last 7 years UPSC papers — solve these and also do test series in your coaching 

4. Essay last 5 years UPSC papers; Lukmaan coaching essay test series

5. Look at toppers essays for guidance 

6. Vision Mains test series for answer writing practice.

Checklist of 

Mains Sources 

1. Current affairs — VisionIAS or Insights ...only one; monthly compilations or weekly, Yojana Magazine — a must for GS 3

2. YouTube and Google — google and YouTube search for topics on UPSC syllabus consistently, many current affairs questions will be picked from there 

3. GS I — Bipan Chandra books, Nitin Singhania, NCERT Indian Sociology books of Class XI and Class XII, Physical Geography NCERT Class XI, GC Leong, Vajiram notes, NCERT World History books class XI and XII, All NCERT books for history, sociology, culture and arts also, RSTV debates

4. GS II — Laxmikant, My notes, GS 2 110+ book, NCERT our constitution at work class XI book

5. GS III — Yojana magazine, Niti aayog reports, Economic survey, Budget, and current affairs, RSTV debates useful for this also 

6. GS IV — Ethics lectures on YouTube by Michael Sandel, focus on solving dilemmas, theoretical portion use notes by Vision IAS and Lukmaan case studied

7. Optional — As per your optional 

8. Essay — topper essays and test series by Lukmaan, Read past 2 years speeches by the President of India and Vice President of India — great topics of Essays themselves, Yojana, focus on structure and simple clear essay.