The Lazy Man’s Guide to the CSE

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I am writing this piece, because, despite my repeated declaration of my not having any pronounced ability or ‘formula’ for success in the CSE, my inbox is getting inundated with requests for ‘tips’ – from persons not having Mechanical Engineering as an optional subject. I may assume I have some sort of command over Mechanical Engineering optional, and as a duty towards fellow strugglers, I have written an article on the same. However, many do insist that I tell them about the ‘rest of my preparation’, and they would not take no for an answer. So, here it goes.

First of all, the disclaimers. I took the exams in the pre-2013 syllabus era. Some of the additions done to the GS syllabus are not covered here, simply because I did not read those topics while preparing, and I would be lying if I say I read those topics now. However, had I been writing under the new pattern, I’m sure the strategy would not have changed much. My CSE strategy was based solely on my growing grip over Mechanical Engineering. It took time, and took mental effort, and yielded quite good marks – over all my three attempts. So, the ‘rest of my strategy’ was basically reading something that should be covered in less time, and yield decent scores – not ‘selection grade’ scores – that responsibility rested on Mechanical Engineering. In fact, over my three attempts, which included two selections, I never crossed 300 even once in my second optional! My GS scores were also quite pedestrian. However, paired with a solid first optional, like Mech, it was a feasible strategy. It was like the Indian Cricket Team of the 1990’s – you had Sachin Tendulkar, and then you had to pick up the next 10 players to make up the numbers. My point is – this is a “lazy man’s strategy” – involves less efforts, for the maximum “marks to effort ratio” – not necessarily the maximum marks. If you have a reliable optional subject, like I had, then you may follow this strategy, and then too, at your own risk.

General Studies – static and dynamic

General Studies has two parts – the static, and the dynamic. The static comprises of things that do not change – generally – like History, Political Science, Geography, Culture etc. The dynamic comprises of things like Contemporary Affairs, Environmental Affairs, Foreign Affairs, Economic Affairs, and practically anything under the sun, which has appeared in any newspaper or magazine in the country. There are separate ways to deal with both. There is a third category, which involves the use of the static knowledge to explain dynamic affairs. Dealing with it is more of a skill, which can be developed in many ways – writing a blog like this may be one of them!

Static

Whatever you do, it is always advisable to get a good GS Compendium. GS Compendiums are basically compilations on the various GS topics, from various renowned books and publications, in one place. Since the lessons need to be summarized, they usually cut through the bullsh*t that authors of the original books often put in to make their books thicker. Like, I got the Tata McGraw Hill General Studies Manual. It is a hefty book – but half of it is exercises. What remains of the book is divided almost equally between the sciences and the humanities. If you are a science / engineering student, you may not need to touch the science part (except if you had no Biology in XII – then that portion may require a quick look). What remains is some 300-400 pages dense with pure, relevant facts – in History (including the National Movement), Geography, Political Science and basic Economics. Just read it twice, thrice, as long as it takes to get it all crammed in. Believe me, this would be the most remunerative quantum of effort you put in in the course of CSE preparation. If you have more time, and a higher pain-threshold, you can always go for reading the books mentioned as ‘Sources’ in the TMH GS Manual. The NCERT textbooks for Intermediate Geography are also good. However, they are to be tried only after being thorough with the Manual.

Dynamic

Dynamic part has gained preponderance in the GS papers over the years. As I said, anything under the sun can be asked under this. It is not possible to be ‘fully prepared’ for this. It is not feasible to be even ‘half prepared’. You can only maximize what you read, and, if you are a believer, pray that enough questions come from what you read. So, reading a good newspaper is a requirement. Many swear by ‘The Hindu’; I personally preferred ‘The Indian Express’ – especially since it had good articles on Economics – my other optional. Both are good newspapers, and either would do equally well.

Reading the paper has to be done a bit methodically. The paper has two broad parts – the news, and the ‘Opinions / Editorials’ (Oped). The news parts needs to be run through speedily. Any important event – a death, award, inauguration, appointment, wedding, book release, commission reports, NGO reports, discoveries, inventions, Supreme Court Cases – the 2 marker stuff, may be noted down. Should hardly take 10-20 minutes to do this. However, the Oped part needs to be read more coolly, with concentration. One should try to have a ‘mental debate’ with the views expressed by the authors of the article. If one has time, it is better to read the opinion pages of both the papers, as they often project the Left and the Right view, and it helps the reader develop a balanced view on most issues. However, even reading a single paper, with a conscious effort at mental debate, can help you develop good substance of your own.

Other than the papers, one source, which is quite good, even if terribly boring, is the Front Line Magazine. It takes care of a part of the Foreign Affairs and the Environmental Affairs, by bringing out obscure issues from nowhere into the limelight. Read it, if you have the stomach.

Internet and other stuff

Internet can be scoured for a variety of aids – one can go through the websites of RBI, MoEF, MEA etc. for some more ideas on the Economic, Environmental and Foreign Affairs. Another important website is that of the Press Information Bureau - which lists important news directly related to the Union Government and its policies - in fact, this site should be followed as religiously as the newspapers. Internet can also be used to find summaries of important documents – like the Economic Survey, the General Budget etc. In my honest opinion – reading the whole text of these documents can be regarded as misallocation of time – the summaries should equip one enough. One can also look for the various ‘Current Affairs’ notes floating on the net – many coaching institutes give out some as a ‘demo’ – if you are regular with the newspapers, the content may look familiar. If it does, do not read them further. If you are in Delhi, or have access to Delhi markets, you can get a copy of the latest ‘GS Notes’ in the market. Again, if you have been honest with the news reading, this will also appear familiar. It is not as if the coaching notes have a lot of relevant factoids – but the fact is, this exam is about beating the competition – and if 90% the competition is reading this, it is better to have one look – but only if time permits.

Another skill that needs to be developed is reducing pages of reading into notes of one or two lines during the preparation, and reassembling those one or two lines into pages of answers in the exam. Many people prepare copious amounts of notes, which are as voluminous as, if not even more voluminous than, the source. In my opinion, notes should be handy, and small enough to help one revise one day before the paper. So, any notes that one plans to prepare must be subjected to this constraint – the final document should be readable in one or two days. Now coming to reassembling – one should always remember that the hundreds of days gone into the preparation amount to nothing if the implementation in the three hours of examinations is not upto the mark. As I have said earlier, first answer only what you know, and relegate what you don’t know to the back of your mind. Papers are getting too lengthy for one to afford rumination over some tricky question. Chances are that by the time you are finished with what you know, your subconscious brain would have formed some answers for the other questions too. I have noticed it. It is also important to break answers into points, as far as possible – it is easier to read and understand for the examiner – and also fills the pages faster, if you have less time!

This was my honest to God strategy for everything other than ‘Mechanical Engineering’ in my CSE attempts. Can’t say it would work for you, or anybody else. It did work for me, and it does not cost me anything to put it here. So, here I rest my keyboard, with best wishes for the reader.

Ignorance is bliss?

It is rather creepy to start two articles with the same quote. Einstein has said – “You do not really understand something unless you can explain it to your grandmother.” (The quote has been attributed to other scientists too, like Feynman, or Rutherford – doesn’t matter.) The point, this time, is that the so ‘taught’ grandmother is no position replace Einstein (or Feynman / Rutherford) at his job. She is no position to suggest to Einstein (or Feynman/Rutherford) on how to carry on his profession. If the said explanation made any change in the status of the grandmother, it was just that she is now in a position a.) to appreciate what her grandson does, b.)to increase her understanding of the subject even more by reading the more advanced texts, and finally, c.) to actually achieve the status of a critic and a collaborator. However, there is a vast chasm between stage a and stage c – and if the same is not appreciated by the grandmother, it can lead to two simultaneous disasters – a. the grandmother shall get intellectually stunted, and b. the relation between her and grandson will get a lot constrained.

Dumbing down is a part of the technique of teaching. Teaching is normally done on a ‘capacity to know’ basis. Any student of chemistry can recall his progression through the orderly ‘solar system’ model of the atom, to the shell model, the subshell model, finally followed by the totally nebulous advanced models based on abstract mathematics. It’s not as if the advanced models were not known when the more primitive models were being taught to the pupils in the elementary classes. So why were these students taught a model known to be ‘wrong’? The answer lies in the ideas of truth, capacity and the objective. The idea of ‘truth’ is that none of the linearly evolved models is completely wrong or completely accurate. For the purpose of understanding that atoms are the smallest discrete elemental particles, even the elementary ‘currants in the bun’ model of atom (that an atom has some positive parts and some negative electrons) would do well. The idea of ‘capacity’ shows that for a 12 year old, understanding probabilistic ideas of orbitals or ‘electron gas’ might not be easy, whereas he can easily extend the analogy of the Newtonian solar system to electrons encircling the atomic nucleus. The idea of ‘objective’ tells us that we do not expect the 12 year old to use the course knowledge to do cutting edge Nobel prize work in his 13^th year. What we expect of him is to appreciate the facts that there are atoms – having positive nuclei and negative electrons outside the nucleus. If he continues to study Chemistry or Physics – he can build on it the higher concepts in atomic modelling. Even if he does not continue with Chemistry, he shall not go “WTF” when he hears the word ‘electron’, and confuse it for some alien death ray.

However, in teaching by dumbing down, one must always keep in mind to tell the students about the fact that they are being taught the dumbed down version. It is the absence of this caveat that can lead to quite disastrous results – as is evident in the contemporary world. One of the reasons for this happening is the fact that most of our knowledge these days comes not from the traditional sources of knowledge, but through the internet and the media – mainly the electronic media. Both of these media are prone to give out information at a primary level, without the caveat. Internet, as such, has a variety of information – ranging from the most rudimentary ‘how stuff works’ to the most cutting edge research paper.  However, constrained by our prior academic base and short attention span for most average topics, we tend to filter this information in favour of the lower end of the spectrum. As far as the electronic media is considered, dumbed down bite-sized nuggets of information and opinion are their fastest moving products. The result is a burgeoning number of people who think they are well-informed enough on any subject to make decisions without rechecking their facts, and to lock arms with those who have trained and dedicated their lives in the service of the subjects.

One of the rather innocuous results of this phenomenon is the increased reliance of consumers on brands. While a large part of buying ‘brand’ may be associated with the feel good and esteem associated with the possession thereof, a substantial number of decisions to buy on the basis of brands stem from the inability to really ‘separate the wheat from the chaff’. While brand may be the only criteria of judgement for a customer totally ignorant of the product’s features, it is more likely that such totally uninformed customers confine themselves a few products and develop a horse sense about the merit of such products. The half-informed customer, on the other hand, is usually the one who is expanding his purchase horizon. So brand based maneuverers find them as sitting ducks. They just need to string up a few intelligent & technical sounding taglines to their advertisements, to get them (the customers) eating out of their hands, and while they are at it, they will be totally convinced about the virtue or the demerits of any product, based on pseudo-scientific inputs fed to them. People are quicker these days to make a judgement and stick to that, even in face of mounting evidence. As Sir Winston Churchill said – “Occasionally he stumbled over the truth but he always picked himself up and hurried on as if nothing had happened.” Ask them about the reasons for their judgement – and they draw a blank, or concoct false ‘facts’. It might be innocuous when you are choosing your toothpaste, but might mean a big deal when you are choosing your post-graduation! Recently a close person had a lot of heart burn over choosing between a degree in a college which is among the top ‘brands’ in the country, or to go a job that he likes very much, and which also pays well. Asking many ‘experienced’ persons of the society did not help – all said that he should opt for the college – aankh band kar ke (without batting an eyelid). When asked ‘why’ – they said it is a very good college, everybody dreams of joining it. On probing further, it came out that they knew nothing about it – and yet they were prepared to advise in favour of it with the certainty of an expert. Being the closest person with some experience, I was asked for advice many times – all I told him was to find the facts, and form an independent opinion based on it. So he gathered the information – and decided not to join the college. The truth, it seems, has really set him free. Still there are people who tell him he did wrong; and the funny thing, they still are not able to justify their judgement with facts!

Recently, a couple of RadioJockeys were made to face criminal charges because somebody complained thatthey were spreading fear through misinformation. All that the poor guys had done that they had announced that ‘dihydrogen oxide’ was going to pour out of the municipal supply on the date of announcement. It was meant as a harmless prank – the assumption being that after initially freaking out, the listeners would realize what this was about. The dumb listeners went berserk. For those who have not got it – ‘dihydrogen oxide’ or H2O would be - plain water. On a more closer note, around a year back, our local Hindi dailies carried some flyers about some locally manufactured Induction heaters.  Among the USP’s listed out, the one that really made me double with laughter was the fact that it claimed that cooking on induction is better than doing it on gas stove because the food cooked on induction does not give you gas! Are people stupid enough to believe that? I don’t know. Since the advertiser was highlighting this point, he might have had somebody in mind. During my last visit to my native village, I heard one guy was forcing his hapless wife to cook on the wood choolhaa, as he believed that the gas stove food might cause him gas!

Around two months back, we had our attachment in the Parliament of India, as a part of the training. Amongst everything else, we had an interaction with some senior Honourable Parliamentarians of most major parties. It was that time of the year when the functioning of the Houses was being disrupted because of various issues – we ourselves could not get the opportunity to see them functioning. So somebody in the class asked why this was happening. We were expecting the usual answers which come on our TV. However, the sagacious reply of the Hon’ble Member was stunning. He said that the expectations the electorate had from them was totally out of line with their jobs. Parliament is the National legislature – it has the function to make Union Laws, and hold the Union government responsible. However, the majority of the electorate expect them to get their roads built, to get their kids employed somewhere with the government, to do them petty favours. They are happier if the actual Legislation is suspended and the Members are free to attend to their personal issues! This is the state of the awareness about the polity and the distribution of responsibilities under it among our masses. Why shouldn’t it be, when most of us are taught the humanities, at least till Class X, by uninterested teachers, as something which has to be mugged up and disgorged in the examination.

Iconic comedian George Carlin has said - "Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups." The idea is even more important given the fact that a general tendency to attack the established institutions on the basis of half-baked ideas, generally aided by an electronic media bereft both of any restraint or any guilt (about further dumbing down the dumb), has been gaining ground recently. While the administration is generally portrayed as not working, the fact is that it works just as well as any other average organization in the country, for the general good of the greatest – manned by experienced persons, who are not all the bloodsucking leeches they are made out to be. When such pressure groups indulge in petty demagoguery, it often leads to pressures that cause the government to indulge in fire-fighting. This may redistribute the efforts of the government in ways that are not optimal or good for the country in the long run, simply to appease those vested interests that mount such pressures. This can lead to great diseconomies in the efforts of the governments to do things right. Strangely, governance seems to be that one job about which everybody other that the doer seems to know better.

I must say here that I am not against the dumbing down of things, in general – by the textbooks, by the news channels, by anyone. I just wish that it should not be done with a vested interest, and it should be done with a clear disclaimer. It should be done only to spur further interest in the subject matter, and to increase the general awareness of the ideas. After all, nobody can be an expert in all subjects – when scarcely few are experts in their own subjects! However I hope that malicious dumbing down to indoctrinate and brainwash would be fought by those in the know – may be with their own benevolent dumbed down models. These are turbulent times, when the masses long steeped in ignorance are becoming aware, in some measure, and are interacting with the system in the light of this awareness. I hope this is a transient phase, and soon, the new found knowledge would be tempered by an awareness of the limitation of that knowledge. Sir Isaac Newton has described this feeling really succinctly – “I was like a boy playing on the sea-shore, and diverting myself now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me.” Real knowledge brings with it real humility, real civility. On the back of such knowledge is raised the edifice of a responsible, informed, involved and mature nation.