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Home All about IAS Exam Syllabus, Eligibility, Papers, Strategy

All about IAS Exam Syllabus, Eligibility, Papers, Strategy

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Everything about IAS Exam (UPSC) Preparation Strategy, Syllabus,

Eligibility, Optional Subjects, Previous Paper, Books, Schedule, Cut off,
Resources.
Every year Union Public Service Commission conducts Civil Services Exams across India. There are around 10 lakhs
forms received by UPSC from aspirants of IAS Exam. Out of which on an average 60% appears in PT. This article will help
you to understand all about IAS exam.

10 times of total vacancy is called for mains written test and 3 times of total vacancy is called for interview.

Eligibility Criteria to apply the Civil service Exam:

To apply for this examination, you should must eligible in certain criteria, as we know that eligibility is an entry point in
any examination.

The candidate must be a citizen of India.

The candidate should have a degree from Central, State or Deemed University. Degree from Correspondence
Education or distance education, the open university is also accepted.
The candidate age must be 21 years old and not must be greater than 32 years old. For Open category is restrict to
32 years, for OBC category is restrict to 35 years and for SC/ST it is restricted to 37 years old.
Number of attempts is limited, for Open category it is limited to 6 attempts, for OBC category it is limited to 9
attempts and for SC/ST candidate there is no limitation (Any number of attempts)

Selection Process
There are three stages of selection process

1. Preliminary Test
2. Mains Written Exam
3. Interview

Number of vacancies are notified by UPSC which remains around 700-1000 for civil services. But only top 70-100
candidates are allotted Indian Administrative Service. Indian Police Service is second most opted choice among
services, third is Indian Foreign Service, Fourth is Indian Revenue Services and then other civil services follows.

Preliminary Test
PT is conducted in the month of August for which form and notification released by the Union Public Service Commission,
New Delhi in the minth of February.

PT exam has Two papers of 100 questions and 80 questions to be finished in two hours each.
These papers are named as

General Studies Paper I

General Studies Paper II

General Studies Paper II is a qualifying paper only with cut off score as 33%, the merit list is created solely based on
score of GS Paper I.

Syllabus of IAS Exam Paper I (PT) (200 marks)

Paper I is having Social Studies, Indian Economy, General Science, Current Affairs, Environment etc. The duration of
exam remains two hours generally scheduled in the first half of the day (9 am 11 am). Following is the syllabus
provided by UPSC for this paper.

Current events of national and international importance.

History of India and Indian National Movement.
Indian and World Geography Physical, Social, Economic Geography of India and the World.
Indian Polity and Governance Constitution, Political System, Panchayati Raj, Public Policy, Rights Issues, etc.
Economic and Social Development Sustainable Development, Poverty, Inclusion, Demographics, Social Sector
initiatives, etc.
General issues on Environmental Ecology, Bio-diversity and Climate Change that do not require subject
specialisation General Science.

Syllabus for Paper II (200 marks)

Paper II has Comprehension and Aptitude. Its duration is also of two hours, scheduled in second half of the day. Syllabus
provided by UPSC:-

Comprehension
Interpersonal skills including communication skills;
Logical reasoning and analytical ability
Decision-making and problemsolving
General mental ability
Basic numeracy (numbers and their relations, orders of magnitude, etc.) (Class X level), Data interpretation (charts,
graphs, tables, data sufficiency etc. Class X level)

Cut off marks for Selection in Civil Services Prelimanry Exam Exam
Paper I Generally cut off marks for selection in PT remains between 50-55 percent. However we suggest you to aim at
scoring 60 percent to play safe.

Paper II It is a qualifying paper candidates need to score a minimum 33% marks in this paper to qualify.

To read previous year Preliminary Exam General Studies Paper Click Here

UPSC Civil Services Mains Exam

After qualifying the Preliminary Examination candidates are allowed to go for mains exam which consist of two parts

Written exam of nine papers

 Personality test (also known as interview)

It consist of nine paper and followed by a personality test (Total marks is 1750)

PAPER SUBJECTS MARKS

Paper A One of the Indian language should be selected 300

Paper B English 300

Paper I Essay writing 250

Paper II Indian Heritage and Culture, History and Geography of the World 250

Paper III Governance, Constitution, Polity, Social Justice and International relations 250

Paper IV Technology, Economic Development, Bio-diversity, Environment 250

Paper V Ethics, Integrity and Aptitude 250

500 (250 x
Paper VI, VII One subject is selected from the prescribed optional subjects
2)

Some of the Indian languages that will be useful while selecting are Hindi, Gujarati, Punjabi, Marathi, Telugu, Urdu etc.

Candidate is allowed to take up literature as an optional subject without the conditionality of having to do his/her
graduation in that languages literature.

The optional subjects are Geography, Agriculture, Chemistry, Economics, Law, Psychology etc.

To Read Complete Mains Syllabus click here

To Read Previous Years Mains Papers click here

Sub Total (Written test) 1750 Marks

Marks of English and Language will not be counted so total marks for Written exam will be 1750 Marks Only

Interview/Personality Test 275 marks

Candidate can give preference of the language in which they may like to be interviewed. UPSC will make arrangement
for the translators.

Grand Total 2025 Marks

A candidate is allowed to use any one language from the Eighth Schedule of the Constitution or English as the medium
of writing the examination.

How to start IAS preparation?

One this you will find common in all aspirants about IAS preparation that they start it with reading NCERT books. Any
beginner can start his UPSC preparation with reading NCERT books. Soon after this aspirants need to go through one
text book of each subject and keep revising as well as practising for answer writing. Along with it a newspaper preferably
The Hindu should be read by IAS Aspirants.

You should install our android app IAS Times to get benefited with regular updates on General Studies and complete
coverage of Current Affairs.
 Civil Services Examination Time Table 2016

Date of Notification/ Date of commencement

Name of Civil Service
Last date for receipt of of Examination and its Remarks
Exam
applications duration

07.08.2016
Civil Services
23.04.2016/ 20.05.2016 (Sunday)
(Prelims) Exam 2016
1 Day

07.08.2016
Indian Forest Service
23.04.2016/ 20.05.2016 (Sunday)
(Prelims) EXAM, 2016
1 Day

12.11.2016
Indian Forest Service Only for those who have cleared
(Saturday)
(Main) EXAM, 2016 the Prelims
10 Days

03.12.2016
Civil Services Only for those who have cleared
(Saturday)
(Main) Exam 2016 the Prelims
5 Days

Do not wait for another day to start preparation. Start it right now. All the best.

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