Learn From Your Mistakes; This IAS Officer Explains How
- Pallavi Priya
- Published on 5 Feb 2022, 9:36 am IST
- 3 minutes read
Highlights
- Junaid Ahmed, who cracked UPSC CSE 2018 with AIR 3, believes mistakes help one to grow, provided one is willing to learn from them.
- He says it is his perseverance and ability to learn from mistakes that brought him success in Civil Services Examination.
- The UPSC topper, who cracked CSE in his fifth attempt, is currently the Joint Commissioner, Ballia, Uttar Pradesh.
- Junaid Ahmed, UPSC CSE 2018 - AIR 3 (Credit: Social Media)
Many UPSC toppers have been busting the myth that only the brightest of students can crack the Civil Services Examination conducted by UPSC. Of late there have been many examples of candidates who didn’t score good marks in their intermediate and graduate exams or even failing, becoming toppers in CSE. One of them is Mr. Junaid Ahmed who cleared CSE in his fifth attempt but secured a place in the top three with AIR 3.
The officer who is currently posted as the Joint Commissioner, Ballia, Uttar Pradesh, says that it’s his ability to persevere and learn from mistakes that brought him this grand success in the end.
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Mr. Ahmed, who belongs to Bijnor, UP, completed his 12th from Aligarh Muslim University. He wanted to get into IIT and prepared for it but couldn’t get through. Similarly, he wanted to go abroad for higher studies but couldn’t clear the exam.
In a video interview to media, he says, “I was an average or you can say a below average student. Starting from my school to college, I only scored around 60 %. I wanted to get into a government college for engineering but ended up in a private institute. I completed my electronics engineering degree from Sharada University and thereafter tried to go abroad for higher study but failed.”
Finally, he started to prepare for UPSC CSE which was one of his childhood dreams and, after years of efforts, he cracked it! He couldn’t reach Mains in his early attempts but after analyzing his mistakes, in his 4th attempt, he got into IRS.And in 2018, he was selected for IAS after coming in the top three.
FOUND MY WAY
Mr. Ahmed believes that no matter what your goal is, you can only be successful if you know why you want to go for it. “Everybody see us (successful UPSC aspirants) as winners, but I was a failure all my life. I never cracked any big exam before CSE. Now, I know the reason. Be it engineering or studies abroad, I failed because I didn’t know the answer of why I was doing it. This wasn’t the case with my CSE preparation. Knowing the ‘why’ helped to stay motivated throughout the journey. I believe that if we find the ‘why’ behind anything, we will definitely find the ways to do it,” he said in the interview.
FAILURE REFINES PERSONALITY
According to Mr. Ahmed, failures actually refine your personality. Nobody in this world tasted success before going through some tough phases of failures. “The only difference between an unsuccessful and successful person is very small. At some point, the unsuccessful one gave up, but the latter didn’t. If you learn to handle pressures and never give up, no one can stop you,” said the UPSC topper.
He himself committed a lot of mistakes in his preparation days which resulted in number of attempts. “In the beginning, I didn’t see the Pre, Mains and Interview as an integrated form which divided my attention. At some point, I also didn’t prioritize making notes.This also costed me. My only advise to aspirants is to find out their mistakes and correct them. And always believe you can do it!.”
END OF THE ARTICLE
