Tips on Political Science Optional by IAS Topper Rajat Sen
(AIR 319, CSE 2013)
Hello everyone. Certainly, there is a real sense of
satisfaction after the grueling fight against the mammoth syllabus and finally
finding myself in that sacred PDF. Well still not that uber satisfaction
acquired but still enjoying each day since the holy 12th June, 2014. Well in
proportion with the overhype surrounding this exam, ever since the qualification
there has been a lot of praise and adulation all around and effect is such that
soaking in Delhi heat seems no less than a beach holiday in Bahamas. A gazillion
calls ranging from congratulations of loved ones to newly found relatives and
friends has tested the limits of android in my phone. And the bills of parties
since then have rendered a bigger fiscal deficit than Uncle Sam. Overall, these
events certainly mean that something has changed and smiley faces of parents and
family members confirm that the change is for better.
Going further, first ten days following the results passed in
a moment. And then suddenly marks were displayed. Almost all of us including me
were shocked by the composition of marks. Frankly speaking, most of the
qualified candidates still don’t have many clues about the marks they have
secured in most of the papers. In my case, shock was a bit low score in
GS/interview and a bit high score in political science. As few more days passed,
I came to know that I have secured the highest marks in Political Science and
International Relations(PSIR). Another round of phone calls/messages started
(thankfully to Shubra mam releasing message which had my phone number). An
enthusiast from Mysore even called at 2:15 AM to congratulate me and asked for
some life saving tips to score highest in the subject. Since then, my wife makes
sure my phone remains at silent mode after 11 PM. Well, overall, calls for
sharing my grand strategy of Political Science were growing.
Of course such things are very much expected from the
qualified gentry. It also prompted me to look back at the tumultuous time of
preparation when there were always a lot of question in the mind regarding the
strategy of various papers. What to read? What to skip? Where to read from?
Which source is trustworthy? And a hell lot of other questions. Also, there was
a will to share my tryst with PSIR as I am a science student/engineer and have
no academic link with political science throughout my whole career. And today
after securing top marks in Political Science and International Affairs in civil
services exam there is a sense of satisfaction (of course with a bit of pride)
as the hard work done in the field of International affairs since last 10-12
years has finally paid off.
Before coming on to nuts and bolts of political science
papers, first let me disclose what prompted me to take this subject. I am an
active news follower of national and international affairs since my childhood.
And India’s lower stature in the world always prompted me to look outside the
country to see why we are in such a state. This had sparked my interest in
international affairs/history and I follow it religiously. I don’t have any date
of origin but I have faint memories of issues in Yugoslavia in early 90’s,
bombing of Iraq in 1998. My first comprehensive international coverage was
following every posssible detail of IC 814 hijacking in December 1999. I was
just 13 years old at that time but followed the event as if my life savings were
in that ill-fated Indian Airlines plane. Words like Kandahar, Taliban, Maulana
Masood Azhar etc have since been printed in my head. I had gathered almost every
bit of knowledge that I could possibly do at that time. But as I belonged to a
very small town and in the absence of internet not much information could get
mustered. Sincerely speaking there were a lot of unanswered questions in my mind
but in that pre-internet era and in such a small town it was really difficult to
quench my thirst. Still, my interest kept on increasing and as events kept
unfolding, the set of unanswered questions increased exponentially. Real
breakthrough came in 2004, when I came to Delhi College of Engineering and got
access to decent internet connection. Google, Wikipedia and this whole web of
knowledge started answering so many questions while opening new ones and links.
This resulted in a chain reaction and I went on reading almost every issue on
international affairs along with its history. By my graduation in 2008, I was an
international affairs hawk. I used to cover every international event sincerely.
Here I would like to remind that I had still not heard about any political
theory or any academic link. My knowledge here was pure factual with little
scope of analysis as I was still unaware of real theories and ideologies behind
all the international events that I had read. Meaning of words like Marxism,
Fascism, Socialism were still limited to dictionary lines. I had not even heard
about famous political thinkers like Plato, Aristotle, Hobbes, Lock etc. To sum
up the above lines, after cricket, I had found made foundation of another hard
core interest which had settled and consolidated in my thoughts.
