Civil services exam: important questions you can expect

Here are some tips that will help you cross the cut-off of 67 marks in CSAT -paper two

Paper 2 of the Civil Services Aptitude Test (CSAT) to be held on Sunday, August 7, comprises 80 questions from six key test areas which can be classified into four broad categories - math, reasoning, English and decision-making and problem solving. In the recent past, the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) has laid stress on English comprehension. So, try and read articles on different topics. You have to familiarise yourself with different types of questions. Certain chapters which are important for each of the four broad test categories of CSAT are specified below.

You must not miss out important questions from math, reasoning, English and decision-making and problem solving. (Shutterstock)

Math

You may get questions from various topics such as numbers (least common multiple, highest common factor), equations, ratio, proportion, variation, time and work, time and distance, geometry and mensuration, counting techniques, probability etc. Data interpretation is yet another important area of CSAT. Here, you need to read, understand and draw necessary inferences from the data as given in various charts like tables, pie charts, line graphs, bar charts, stacked graphs, or other forms. The questions in DI may be based on simple observation, or basic arithmetic calculations like comparison of fractions, percentage calculations. Go through these chapters and be familiar with different models of questions.

Comprehension

In this part, all the questions will be on passages. From 2011 to 2014, it has been observed that the number of passages ranged from eight to 12. Also, the number of questions were between two and five per passage. In 2015, there were a number of questions from passages. No prior knowledge of any particular topic is required to answer these questions. The passages may be based on social, political, economic, technological or science topics. Your ability to draw a logical conclusion from the content of the passage will be tested.

Reasoning

In the reasoning part, you need to practise various models of questions from different topics like number series, letter series, analogies, coding-decoding, seating arrangement, cubes, venn diagrams, deductions, counting triangles etc.

Decision-making and problem-solving

The types of questions in this test area of decision making and problem solving will include a short description of a situation where you will be asked to choose what will you do in that situation. Such questions are, usually, easy to moderate in difficulty level.

The author is deputy general manager, TIME.