UPSC Essentials : Expert Talk | ‘CSAT was meant to test general aptitude, not to select an expert,’ says Deepanshu Singh

Manas: This year’s UPSC Prelims is being seen as one of the toughest papers so far. CSAT paper, which is qualifying in nature, has become one of the most difficult areas to prepare. What are the issues with the CSAT paper that the aspirants and you are finding challenging or unfair?

Deepanshu Singh: CSAT was meant to test the general aptitude of civil services aspirants. It never meant to select an expert. Aptitude is tested to ascertain whether a person can be trained in the future or not so you need only basic mathematical, reasoning, and comprehension skills. Some inherent issues with the paper, as I see of late have been —

1. Undue emphasis on mathematics: Many argue that the paper places undue emphasis on mathematical and quantitative aptitude. This is problematic for aspirants from non-mathematical backgrounds like humanities, arts, and some streams of science but more so for students coming from rural and underprivileged backgrounds. It is an important psychological fact that early and formative years of learning have an impact on your higher education and these students who come from such backgrounds find it difficult to cope or compete with students from urban-middle class city-educated aspirants.

2. Complexity: Over the past few years, the complexity of questions, especially in logical reasoning and quantitative aptitude, has increased. While challenging questions may be suitable for testing aptitude, there is a thin line between challenging and discouraging. A few of my students who have even qualified for the exam and have been allocated the coveted IPS, IRS couldn’t clear the 2023 Prelims CSAT paper as they were appearing to improve their rank. Some of them are even from IITs.

So, no being an IITian or from a technical background doesn’t guarantee success in UPSC CSAT Prelims.

In my opinion, UPSC has to really think about what kind of candidates are they looking for.

3. Reading comprehension: While this section tests English comprehension skills, the passages have sometimes been long and time-consuming, leaving less time for other sections. Most of the passages have a question that asks the assumption, or theme of the passage which can be challenging for aspirants from Hindi medium background for two major reasons. First, poor Google copy-paste translation, and second non-availability of quality reading material in Hindi newspapers which limits their comprehension ability under pressure in this paper. Reading newspapers, especially the editorials, is helpful in speed reading and analysing the essence of the passage quickly as most of these passages are picked up from the editorials of The Indian Express or some book.

4. Diversion from the prescribed syllabus: The syllabus prescribed by the UPSC mentions questions based on decision making, 10th class mathematics, interpersonal skills including communication skills, general mental ability, etc however when you see the past few years’ trends, there are no questions on decision making or communication skills. In fact, there has been a sudden increase in the number and the complexity of mathematics questions which by no means are of general mental ability.

Manas: The CSAT paper according to UPSC is a ‘qualifying’ paper. What should ‘qualifying’ mean? How far does the UPSC CSAT paper ‘qualify’ the general understanding of a qualifying paper?

Deepanshu Singh: The word ‘qualifying’ should be self explanatory. Ideally, a ‘screening tool’ should filter out the non-serious from the serious candidates. Another major role of a qualifying paper should be to assess the role competence and the analytical skills required for the post for which the examination is being conducted. A ‘qualifying’ paper should essentially serve as a filter to ensure that candidates possess a minimum standard of aptitude and skills necessary for the role. It shouldn’t be a major eliminatory hurdle.

The CSAT, with its current difficulty level, appears to be moving away from this principle. Instead of ensuring basic aptitude, it is eliminating a significant number of candidates, many of whom might excel in areas more directly relevant to civil services.

Now in civil services, there are so many diverse posts and roles and all of them require some basic numeracy skills, reading and comprehension, and reasoning skills and the paper should be designed to test just this. Unfortunately, the present paper somehow doesn’t fit this criteria. According to me, it is getting biased towards people who are gifted in these skills or who have taken some advanced training, coaching or guidance in some institute for this paper. The present paper pattern somehow makes candidates believe that attending a coaching is a must. (We will discuss solutions in the latter part of the interview.)

Ironically, the cut-off for qualifying prelims was supposed to be decided by Paper 1 consisting of general studies, rather it is now being decided by Paper 2 where most good candidates are being filtered out. Some of my students who scored 20+ marks higher than the cutoff are missing out on prelims by 1 or 2 marks due to the CSAT paper.

Manas: Are students from engineering and English medium background more comfortable with the current format of CSAT? Being an engineer by qualification who mentors students from different disciplines, what is your opinion on this?

Deepanshu Singh: To an extent, yes. Though there are a lot of students qualifying from Humanities and non-engineering backgrounds, a recent report by the Parliamentary committee has made this observation which answers your question.

Students from non-engineering background from rural areas — with no proper guidance and quality education — are the most disadvantaged in this situation.

Though as I mentioned in the recent pattern, a lot of engineering students are failing to qualify for the CSAT paper due to the extreme complexity of the paper. Some ofcourse are unable to analyse the demand, but it is mostly because of the limited choice of questions available to the students once the paper becomes extremely challenging.

Having said that, I would also agree that some deserving candidates do make it to the final list, but we also have instances where some top 10 rankers have marginally qualified the CSAT paper. What if they would have missed by 0.5 marks? That’s the point to ponder.

Manas: Having talked about challenges and the increasing difficulty level, what will change in UPSC preparation and coaching industry?

Deepanshu Singh: I think it’s a boon for the coaching industry. This unpredictablity of UPSC exams questions have made at least one thing predictable now, many students are joining specialised CSAT batches which range from Rs 1000 to 50,000 — depending on the institute and the teachers from whom you are seeking guidance.

I have myself studied at convent schools and IIM, and I feel the paper is getting tougher every year.

Aspirants are now more scared. Some of my students who couldn’t qualify for the exam in the last two or three attempts are spending around four or five months on a qualifying paper which requires just 33 per cent marks, instead of honing their skills in general studies as they just don’t want to be out of the list because of the CSAT paper. Some of them have given up hope. They have been looking for some alternative as they think it’s a waste of time now if UPSC keeps on setting this kind of paper.

Manas: We are not sure by when the challenges you mentioned will be addressed. Many of the aspirants will appear next year and have less time. They write to us seeking constructive solutions as they want to convert obstacles into opportunities. Let’s talk about some constructive solutions. How should aspirants approach this paper?

Deepanshu Singh: Even though there is no one fixed way of approaching this, I would like to share some tips that I regularly tell my students and it has worked for them.

I see reading comprehension (RC) as the king. On average 25-27 questions will be from the reading comprehension, so make it your strength. Focus your energy and get maximum return in a qualifying paper like CSAT instead of preparing it like a Mains paper. Even if you get 22-23 questions right, you can score around 54-55 marks just from this section. Now, you just need 15-18 marks more to be on the safer side which comes down to solving 6-7 questions correctly without any negative. You can prepare RC section by solving PYQ of at least 5 years to understand the type of questions asked which mainly are of 4-5 types.

Also as mentioned before, reading newspapers like The Indian Express and quality books helps in this section. One important tip for all aspirants is to remove any prior knowledge bias you have as it comes naturally from reading such a diverse syllabus. If the passage says that CO2 is not a greenhouse gas, then it is not.

1. Always aim for 100 marks. You need to attempt around 45 questions (that means you don’t have to even think of 35 questions), out of these 20-22 you can get right from RC, rest you have to now figure out from Reasoning and Maths. Aim for 100 because then you will land up with a comfortable range of 80-90 to prepare for Mains comfortably at least that should be the aim. If you anyway attempt less, you are reducing your chances.

2. In reasoning, some areas were predictable but based on the latest trend even this has become tricky. Still, some questions on coding-decoding, sitting arrangement, cubes, and age can be practiced which can help you solve 6-7 questions correctly.

3. Last but not least is the Maths or the quantitative aptitude section which is the main culprit here for most aspirants. I would advise focusing on certain topics here and solving as many as 20-30 different types of questions to get a hang of it. Now this is for someone who finds this section difficult, some of them breeze through maths but get stuck in RC. Number system, speed distance time, percentages, permutation, and combination are some topics that cannot be avoided. Try to practice at least 15-20 different types of questions based on the topics that have been asked in the past 3-4 years.

The above strategy will only work if you get enough practice. For someone who fears this paper, I would say practice different sections every weekend for at least 3-4 months, and someone comfortable with the paper still needs to practice MCQs at least a month or 15 days before the paper to get a hang of it.

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