The journey to civil services does not need any preplanned layout in life. It can be started at any point of time when one is ready to jump into the fray. The story of Aswathy JiJi is a fine example to prove this. A native of Murickassery in the Idukki District of Kerela, she left a job at Infosys to appear for civil services exam and bagged the 41st position in UPSC CSE 2020. In an interaction with Indian Masterminds, Aswathi JiJi shared some insights of her UPSC journey.
EARLY LIFE
She started her civil services journey when she crossed the age of 26. Her aim was to become an Indian Police Services Officer. She felt that representation of women in the forces was still less, and this spurred her on to join the police force. She did her schooling from Kendriya Vidyalayas of multiple places because her father who served in the Indian Air force got transferred every four years. She graduated in Engineering with Electronics & Communication from the College of Engineering, Munnar in 2012. After that, she joined the corporate giant Infosys in 2013 and served there for 3 years.
UPSC JOURNEY
Aswathi JiJi shared with Indian Masterminds some insights of her UPSC journey, and also revealed why she entered the fray. She said, “Civil service was not my childhood dream, I wanted to go abroad and pursue higher studies. I enrolled myself on an online program to clear the IELTS exam. The mentor of that program observed my abilities and suggested that I prepare for civil services. After that, in 2016, I resigned from Infosys and started my preparation.”
Initially, she started her preparation from home and covered NCERT and other basic books. She also attempted the test series questions to understand the pattern. However, she observed that her self-preparation was not sufficient, and she needed expert guidance. Therefore, she moved to Chennai in 2017 and joined Officers IAS Academy.
In her first two attempts, she did not clear the Prelims, but in 2019, in her 3rd attempt, she cleared Prelims as well as Mains, but her name did not appear in the successful candidates’ list because she felt short of 18 marks. 2020 CSE was her fourth attempt, and she scored the required marks this time to enter her name in the coveted list.
EXAM STRATEGY
About her strategy, she said, “For Prelims, basic book reading, coaching material and test series were sufficient. In order to prepare for Mains, I used to write one answer every day so that the habit of writing gets developed and this helped me to score well. I also focused on my optional subject Geography.” She further said that for Mains, aspirants should focus on ‘scoring papers’ first, like Essay Writing, Ethics Paper and Optional. These three papers are the most scoring subjects and if one scores well in these three, then chances of clearing the exam increases. “The Mains score decides whether you are in or out because in the interview you have very less marks to score. Therefore, aspirants must dedicatedly practice answer writing to score well in Mains,” she said.
ADVICE TO ASPIRANTS
Her advice to all civil services aspirants is to “always follow the instructions of your mentors and if you face setbacks during the journey, never get demoralized. Always be in touch with your peer group, family and mentors to overcome any negative thought.”
