Everyone experiences failure in life, but what sets you apart is how you handle it. Whether you let the failure overwhelm you and pull you down even further, or you recoup your strengths and move ahead with renewed hope and determination. We get to read many such stories about our civil servants, who despite setbacks, achieved their targets.
Today, Indian Masterminds presents one more story of such a bureaucrat, an IAS officer to be precise, Ms. Chahat Bajpai, who took two failures in her stride and went ahead with her plan to crack the civil services exam. It was hard work coupled with careful planning that helped her to pass the exam with good marks in the third attempt. We highlight her preparation strategy, especially essay writing, and her tips to aspirants on how to score better.
BACKGROUND
Ms. Chahat Bajpai is currently posted as Sub Collector in Nandyal Sub-division, Kurnool district, Andhra Pradesh. She cleared UPSC CSE 2019 with AIR 59 in her third attempt. Born in 1994, Ms. Bajpai was always good at studies, and she had cleared JEE. She pursued Electrical Engineering at IIT Kanpur. After completing her degree, she started preparing for UPSC.
She faced failure twice during her UPSC journey. Yet she wasn’t discouraged. Rather, each time after a failure, she worked doubly hard to succeed. After two failed attempts, she made it to the final list of successful candidates in the third attempt.
ON CONSISTENCY AND HONESTY
To every aspirant preparing for UPSC CSE, IAS officer Bajpai recommends looking into previous years’ question papers, so that they can get an idea of questions that are asked in the exam, which will help them in preparing in a much better manner. She further says that “if you want to succeed in the UPSC exam, you must work consistently and honestly, as honesty is the key to success.”
ON ESSAY WRITING
She advises on being careful while selecting an essay topic. “You should always select an essay paper topic in which you can effectively express your own opinions.”
According to her, even if you don’t know how to write well, or you are not a person who likes to read much, then also, writing essays is not a big deal for you.
“Earlier I used to think that people who write blogs or who are students of English literature can write a good essay, but that is not the case. Everyone has to prepare separately for UPSC essay writing, understanding what and how it is written in the exam.”
DO NOT DEVIATE FROM TOPIC
During her first and second attempt, she used to go off the topic while writing essay. However, she learnt her mistake and worked on it. “I used to turn the previous pages and see if I was deviating from the topic, as I didn’t want to make the same mistake again.”
USE SIMPLE WORDS AND QUOTES
She further asks the aspirants to not use too many decorative words and instead use simple words in a more effective manner. “Also, prepare some quotes in advance which can be used in your essay, but use them when needed only.”
DEVELOP YOUR OWN STYLE
She advises sitting for tests to know one’s strengths and weaknesses in essay writing. “If possible, give a test so that you can know where there is a deficiency in your essays. Have a senior who can check your essays so that you know the mistakes.”
Stressing the importance of practice writing an essay daily, she asks aspirants to develop their own style. “Do not copy anyone. Develop your own distinctive style. By taking care of such things, you can definitely score well in this paper.”
