SOME TIPS FOR ESSAY WRITING Tip1# -------- You must….. Think for 30-45 minutes before you start the Essay writing You’ve 3 hours to write the essay. Don’t immediately start 1st try to recall everything that you can remember / want to say about the essay. If you need rough work for this then take a pencil and write them all (in very brief) on the end of the answer sheet. Do you remember any? 1. any famous quotes? 2. Current events 3. People 4. Historical events 5. Laws / Administrative polices related to it *Related to that topic, What are the 1. Positive 2. Negative sides 3. obstacles 4. Reforms you suggest? Once you’re done adding everything that you can think about, regarding the essay- then give those topics, order of preference. 1.2.3.4. The order is very important, just like in wedding parties you start with Soup…dal-roti and…Ice cream in the end. The order should be 1. Introduction 2. Background / History related 3. Main concept / theory / what the subject is about 4. Current scenario related to it. 5. Good sides 6. Negative sides / obstacles 7. Suggested reforms 8. Conclusion everything has to be written in its place. --------------------------- Now SOME DON’Ts --------------------------- Tip#2: --------- What not to write in essay 1. Autocracy is better than democracy. (know that it’s the democracy that’s allowing you to criticize it) so you should never justify certain solution to India’s problems. 2. Excessive criticism of Govt. / administration (I mean the frontline and The Hindu’s stand) 3. Seeing negative sides with out suggesting reforms in it. Tip#3: --------- Provocative Essays Sometimes the essay topics are given in such a way, that you want to agree all the way. E.g. 1. Panchayati raj is wastage of tax payer’s money. (yes it seems so, just like NREGA but when you’re writing an Essay you need to maintain some balance) 2. Poor people are their own enemies. In such cases – just because he gave you statement doesn’t mean you’ve to sing in his tune throughout the paper.DO NOT forget to show the other side of the mirror. Its Easier to criticize a non working things than to fix it. (Remember this all time during essay.) Donot give filmy solutions to real life problems. (Munna Bhai MBBS / Slum Dog Millioner.) Tip#4: --------- Donot get personal Don’t go naming individual politicians – their achievement / scandals (Kalmadi, Raja,Amar Singh etc.) (except in the foreign policy related essay, where you’ve to analyse from entire Nehru’s Panchsheel era to Vajpayee’s Lahore Bus visit and current affairs.) our Foreign policy has changed with every prime minister so their names need to be mentioned. Never write essay talking like “Congress did this and BJP did that.” It’s the trait of a common man, not of a future officer. Give a balanced answer With out getting into hero-worship or mud slinging If criticizing Govenrment in the essay alone was going to make you IAS officer, then every journalist of Aaj Tak would be an IAS officer. An officer’s trait is to remain ‘anonymous’, ‘faceless’ and neutral- meaning your essay should look like it has been written by a graduate. Same applies for 1. Religion / culture/ language- literature (in philosophical essays) 2. States (in polity / federalism / Development) I’m not saying you should transform into a sterile person writing the essay with out having any personal view/ opinion or righteous anger but, you mustn’t become too much passionate about certain things. I’m saying all this because you can never be sure about what will be the political / ideological / religious / regional alignment of the examiner. This suggestion also applies while dealing with Public Administration (optional subject). Tip#5: Quotes --------------------- 1. Don’t make mistakes in writing who said what. E.g. you quote Abraham Lincon’s sentence and write George Washington said it. nothing will make you look more stupid in the eyes of the examiner than that. 2.Quote Exactly as it was said. Mao said “Power flows from the barrel of a gun” so you should not write it as “barrel of the gun contains power” or “muzzle of the gun flows the power” You must quote the quote verbatim. If you’re not sure then don’t quote it. Tip#6: --------- Padding & Deviating from the subject Even in the worst case, you’re supposed to write 1200-1500 words for a 200 marks essay. Padding means, you don’t know the exact answer so you just beat around the bushes and write the garbage stuff to fill up the pages, while this tactic does work in the school and college exams but don’t try it in the essay paper. Don’t write too many proverbs / quotes/ (invented) case studies/ examples per page. It makes the examiner think that you’ve no input of your own so you’re just filling up the pages. Donot pick up the subject where your idea or thought content is very low. Ex. you picked up “ Do we need nuclear power” – So you start with how thermal power-stations create pollution, there is huge demand and low supply of electricity, nuke power is cheap, and then the dangers such as Japanese Tsunami etc. After 4 pages, your thoughts and ideas are exhausted-you’ve nothing more to say and assuming that you write 100 words per page, you realise that only 400 words won’t get you any marks ! now you can’t scratch those pages and write a new essay on new topic, you’ve wasted enough time on this one. So you decide to continue with this nuke-power essay and start rewriting the same stuff you already stated in different ways and then you’ll deviate from the main topic- like nuke power is unsafe as we saw in Japan so we need to switch to renewable energy source like Sun, Wind and Water -> then 4 pages on advantages of renewable energy as if this is an essay on “the benefits of Non- renewable energy” and not on nuke power, you write about the pro-cons of hydro-electricity like dams and displacement of people. Then you realise “omg, displacement of people also applies while making nuke- powerplants like in Maharashtra! “ so you come back to the topic -half page written but still you’ve not filled up enough pages so you start talking about to land-acquisition policy and start writing the pro- cons..another half page on it. Then you think “oh i must talk something about the Indo-US nuke deal” so you go on talking about how we haven’t signed the CTBT and yet N.S.G gave us clearance and China-Pakistan couldn’t stop it so we are a global power now and we deserve a permanent seat in UNSC! This kind of padding goes on until time is up. You’ve messed up the whole thing, you totally deviated from the subject. Your essay doesn’t have any flow of thoughts or proper rhythm. The seasoned examiners immediatly sniff out this padding and they don’t give much marks for it, your expected score for this kind of garbage writing is less than 50/200, means even with decent score in all other papers, your chances of getting interview call is close to zero. You’ve jeopardised your chances of selection in IAS, you’ve digged your own grave. That’s why 1. take great care in picking up the subject 2. first 30-40 minutes for thorough thinking. 3. stick to the subject. Same applies while dealing with the big 60 marker question in GS and optional papers. (not 30 minutes of thinking but atleast 5-7 minutes.) Essay is not something that can be learned reading books or reading for 1 month. It’s a continuous and long process.
Posted on: Mon, 29 Sep 2014 15:33:08 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015