It’s the dream of a lifetime to become a civil servant for many of us. Some wants to be an IAS, some wants to be an IPS or IFS. UPSC is the toughest exam to crack and out of over 50 lakh aspirants only less than a thousand hundred manage to clear it and less than 100 get into the IAS. That’s why many aspirants give up mid-way or at the most are content with whichever service they get into.
But only a few have a mettle like Nidhi Bansal, who just didn’t have ‘giving up’ in her vocabulary and kept striving to soar higher. Her story is unique in many ways. She made five attempts at UPSC and cleared it three times. In her fifth attempt, she secured 23rd rank and became one of the toppers.
Two times IPS and then IAS
Ms. Bansal was just a small- town girl from Morena, Madhya Pradesh with big dreams. Since, her childhood she was empathetic towards people’s miseries and wanted to do ameliorate them.
She didn’t have a magic wand to do that. So she did what most of us do. After completing 12th standard, she got selected in NIT Trichy and completed her B.tech with computer science. She then got a placement in Texas Instrumental with a fat package.
She was not meant for coding
While she was working in Bangalore, she realized that she is not meant for coding. She was not able to connect with the work and was not satisfied with what she was doing with her life. Her father being a businessman and mother a homemaker, were unable to five her much advice about her career. But, one of her uncles suggested her to try UPSC.
In an interview with media, she said that until then she didn’t know how many services would be available after clearing the UPSC. When she researched about that, she made her mind about becoming an IAS officer one day.
GOING FOR THE IAS
She quit her job and started preparations. First two attempts were futile but she didn’t give up. “After the failure, I realized what I was doing wrong. Despite being good in Mathematics, I chose Sociology for my optional without any reasonable reason. I changed that and it really helped me”, she said.
In 2016 and 2017, she got into the IPS and was allotted Tripura and Jharkhand cadre respectively. Normally one takes the services available but Nidhi was different. This was not meant to be the culmination of her efforts. She wanted to become an IAS officer and didn’t want to give up after coming this close.
THE LUCK SMILES ON THE BRAVE
In 2019 she gave another go at Civil Services exam and this time she cracked it with flying colours and secured 23rd rank. Currently, she is taking training at LBSNAA and is preparing herself for the long journey ahead. Her only advice to UPSC aspirants is to master their subjects and not forfeit their selection unless they like her, have absolute confidence in their capabilities
