Approach to Answer Writing For Mains

The aim of this section is to familiarize the students with important tips to be borne in mind while writing Mains answers in UPSC examination.

Your Answer is a Reflection of Your personality in Mains

While in the ‘Interview’ or ‘Personality Test’, the candidate is physically present before the board, it is only the answer paper that is present before the examiner in Mains examination. Hence, you need to be aware of this fact and ensure that your answers reflect not just your preparation and knowledge but also your approach to any given question. In this regard, the following important points may be useful.

• Understand the import of the question and also the key words in the question - separate discussion below on key words

• Break the question into sub questions and create suitable sub-headings for various aspects of the question

• Have a simple introduction to the answer with suitable statistics from government sources or international agencies where possible

• Break the answer into sub-headings and write in simple but precise bullet points below the sub-headings

• Provide a overall conclusion based on the question and always maintain a positive outlook in the conclusion

• Link the answer to various government schemes in that particular area wherever possible

• Provide flow charts, venn diagrams, tables where you can summarise some points in a lucid manner. But don’t answer the entire question only through such tables. You should write the important points in simple sentences but can use such diagrams for summarizing the various sub-headings or issues.

• Stick to word limit – Don’t deviate beyond 10%