Daughter of a scientist, roots in Bihar, and with a Humanities background, Preeti Kumari, cleared UPSC CSE 2022 with All India Rank 130. This is the second time that she cleared CSE, as last year she had cleared the exam with rank 242 and is undergoing IRS training.
Preeti started her education from West Bengal, studied in Patna for four years from class 4 to 8. Thereafter, she studied in Delhi till class 12 and did her graduation in Political Science from Miranda house, Delhi University.
“Previous attempt was more special to me because that was the first time, I cleared Civil Services,” she told Indian Masterminds.
CHILDHOOD DREAM
For the girl from Bihar, clearing CSE was a childhood dream. When she was in class 9, Preeti had made up her mind to sit for CSE. Back in those days, the only thing she knew about CSE was that it’s a medium to serve the people and nation. She started with this idea. However, as time passed, her ability to work hard and enjoy the subjects aligned. “Most of the things that are demanded in this line of examination, align with my natural instincts, as well,” she explained.
With the support of her parents throughout this journey, Preeti, despite facing failures, didn’t give up on her dream.
She shared with Indian Masterminds that her fifth attempt was unplanned. She had, in fact, decided to not give the exam and take a break instead. However, knowing that she has already cleared CSE, and is left with few attempts, and with the thought of nothing to lose, she filled the form and gave the Prelims exam without any preparation. However, for mains and the interview round, she worked hard and left no stones unturned and qualified with better rank.
RECTIFYING PAST MISTAKES
In her previous three attempts, when Preeti was unable to clear the Prelims, she realized that there was an error of strategy. She analyzed those mistakes and changed these by the time she gave her fourth attempt.
In this attempt, she worked a lot on her written strategy. However, she couldn’t really improve on marks. But the interview round helped her to get a better rank in this attempt. Last year, she scored 151 in the personality test and this time she jumped to 198 by identifying the mistakes in her previous attempt.
WHY PSIR
Having a humanities background in class 11 and 12 and graduating in Political Science, Preeti chose Political Science & International Relations (PSIR) as her optional subject. “Out of all the subjects, I always loved Political Science more,” she said.
TIPS
Preeti urges the aspirants to focus on understanding what is demanded from the examination and work hard accordingly. Adding to it, she said that aspirants should solve previous years’ question paper and give test series, but, more importantly, she asks them to keep a Plan B because of high failure rate in the examination.
Sharing how she balanced her mental and physical well-being all through her journey, she said that CSE does take a high toll on it. “Make sure to do some kind of physical activity daily for 45 minutes. I tried to use social media less so that there is lesser comparison with other people, and being a little bit spiritual to know the larger picture of life helped me a lot,” she said in conclusion.
