It is all okay! We all know that the UPSC exam is tough to clear. But it is not impossible. Students must prepare for the huge syllabus on various subjects. Among them, current affairs take the major portion.
Here comes the importance of reading newspaper in the right manner. Explore the tips and strategies to read the newspaper for the UPSC exam.
We consider newspaper analysis as an important element for the students to prepare. The first step is to understand why newspaper reading is important for the civil services examination. Later, you can study about how to do it.
In the past few years, many questions in the UPSC exams are from the current affairs section. Moreover, these questions appear in all the stage of the exam. Don’t you think it is a serious matter of concern?
Read newspapers as per the requirement of the civil services exam. Apart from exam preparation, you must learn what’s happening around you and improve general knowledge. Groom yourself to be an eminent IAS officer.
There are many resources available to prepare for current affairs. Some of them to include are:
However, the best practice is to dedicate one hour for reading “The Hindu” newspaper on a daily basis. It would definitely help you to perform well in prelims, mains, and also in the interview phase.
Every IAS aspirant must have good communication and vocabulary skills. How can you work on it? Simple idea! Just read newspapers. It improves your vocabulary along with knowledge awareness.
That’s right! There are many newspapers available in the market today. But which is good from the UPSC exam point of view? Mostly, The Hindu and The Indian Express are preferred.
Both of these newspapers cover the majority of the aspects as expected by the UPSC syllabus. It includes articles on national, international, sports, science, and technology issues.
You need not follow both. Choose one that best suits your need. Please do not skip the process of reading newspapers. Here is the list of tips you must keep in mind while reading newspapers.
In the first place, understand the syllabus properly. You should know what topics come in both prelims and mains. UPSC exam is very strict in terms of the syllabus.
You can clearly focus on important events happening around, schemes, initiatives, science & technology developments, and government policies.
Concentrate on major developments. For example, it can be schemes, controversies, issues, initiatives, etc. Such questions appear in General Studies Paper 1, 2, 3, and 4.
Analyse the issues in depth. Try to see the same issue from a different perspective.
You must analyse the issue and understand the concept. Do not read like a story. For example, let’s assume that you are reading the business news. If you do not know how to understand inflation, Sensex, repo, CPI, etc.
Then, how can you understand in the practical aspect? Above all, do not just read for satisfaction. Try to understand it from scratch.
Make crisp notes which is concise and to the point in nature. There is no meaning if you copy the entire editorial from the newspaper. At least, be aware of 5 to 6 points about each topic. So that you can easily write an answer for 10 marks easily.
Do not stop just after reading the newspaper once. Many aspirants read it for the first time and put it away. Later, they wait for a monthly magazine.
Students just depend on the notes given by coaching institutes. But, please make notes after reading the newspapers. It helps you to get better understandability.
Do not skip reading the newspapers for a few days. Generally, students assume that it is okay to skip and read all the days’ newspaper at once. It is not humanly possible.
Do not interlink the concepts in textbooks with the newspaper articles. UPSC exam preparation expects comprehensive understanding and you must adopt it.
Current affairs question need not appear directly from the article. It can appear from the background of understanding. This is done to test your capacity to analyze the issues.