Team Sampada : Could you please give a brief introduction to our readers about yourself.
Siddalingappa Pujaar: My full name is Siddalingappa K. Pujaar. I am from Dharwad district, Annigeri. I completed my primary and high school education in Annigeri itself. I had done my PUC in J.S.S. College, Dharwad. Then I did my graduation from Bangalore University, UVCE Bangalore. I got a gold medal in engineering in E&C branch (2015).
Later, I worked in Tejas Networks for 2.5 years as a product verification engineer. Then I left my job and I started preparing for UPSC in 2018. I was not able to clear it in my earlier attempts. I went till interview in 2019, but I couldn’t make it to the list. In that same year, I was able to crack one more exam conducted by UPSC – CAPF (Central Armed Police Force). I got posted in Gurugram as an assistant commandant in CRPF in 2022.
To tell you about family, my mother is a housewife and she also works in the agriculture field and my father is a bus conductor in NWKRTC. I have two younger brothers. Both are helping my mother in agriculture activities. I recently got married in 2022. My wife is working at a company as a technical lead.
TS: We are glad that you cleared civil services. Congratulations. Can you give some idea to our readers about these exams and the entire process?
SP: Thank you so much. Everyone considers UPSC as the toughest exam in India. If you consider the top 10 toughest exams, UPSC stands first because around 10 lakh + people take this exam and only less than 700-800 people crack it. This exam is conducted by UPSC, Union Public Service Commission. It’s a constitutional body. Every year they call for examinations based on vacancies given by the State and Centre. This exam is conducted in three stages:
* Prelims Stage: First stage is a preliminary examination which includes 2 papers-General Studies (GS) and a CSAT (Civil Services Aptitude Test) paper. There will be two papers conducted on the same day, each for a 2 hour duration. CSAT is a qualifying paper where you are supposed to score more than one-third of the total marks. If you clear CSAT, they’ll check GS which is based on cut-off. Based on the number of vacancies, they will select the candidates for the next step.
* Mains Stage: After prelims, they’ll give three months time to prepare for mains. In mains, they will test us in multiple papers. There will be General Studies -GS1, GS2, GS3, GS4, an essay paper and we have to select one optional paper-Optional has 2 papers belonging to the same subject. Optional is very important. There are many optional subjects like mathematics, languages, engineering, anthropology, and humanitarian subjects. They give a list of optional subjects which you can choose. I chose Kannada literature as my optional. General Studies is divided into 4 papers covering wide variety of subjects—history, society, geography, political science, economy, science & technology, environment etc. They will also check about various values like honesty and integrity.
* Interview Stage: Based on our performance in mains, they will call us for an interview. It is for 275 marks and will be conducted in UPSC Bhavan, Delhi. There will be a five member panel which includes the chairperson, besides the other members. They will take the interview for around 30 minutes, it may extend to more than an hour depending on the board members. They try to understand the candidates and check various parameters to see whether that person is suitable for civil service or not. They start with your background which includes your family and education. Then they move to your state (Domicile) questions or questions related to current affairs. Later they may give you some case studies – like if you are in this situation what would have done or how you can improve. So this is the interview stage, based on your performance in mains and interview stage, they will release the result.
TS: What motivated you to take up administrative service? Can you give details about your preparation phase?
SP: I was motivated from my childhood. I came from a very humble background and in my native area, education is completely neglected. Very few people encourage their children to go to school and study because it’s an agricultural area and they mainly want their children to help them in earning. I always wanted to be an example and show the people that education can bring changes in them. Since most of them are landless labourers and who don’t have land and they work in someone’s field, or they work in garments or construction, they hardly dream that education can bring such changes.
I completed engineering and got a job, which was much needed for my family because we also wanted to have a comfortable life like others, but the thought of writing UPSC was always there. If I go with the job, I can make changes but if I choose civil service, I can make a bigger impact because if I become an administrative officer, I will be the head of some district, bring changes in the district and people from my village will also get inspired. So that’s why I resigned from my job and I came to civil service preparation in 2018.
About my UPSC preparation, when I was working in a company I wanted to join some institutions for coaching. Initially, based on discussion with friends, I thought about taking coaching in Delhi, which would be a huge financial burden. I could not ask my father to pay for my studies because it was my decision. So with my limited savings , I focused on studying. I thought I’ll study for only 1 year and if I clear, I’ll go ahead or else join a company back. In 2018, I studied only for 4 months and couldn’t clear the prelims-missed it by two marks. It gave me a lot of confidence in my preparation. I used to go through YouTube, Newspapers etc and along with my own plan, I was able to clear prelims and mains in 2019.
I joined CRPF in February, 2022. I was working there and at that time I never thought to give another attempt because CRPF training was difficult. I hardly used to get time for studies. My wife always used to encourage me that I left my job to do something good in civil service and give one more attempt this year. I left CRPF last year. I gave my attempt and in limited time itself I was able to crack it because the main things are your self-discipline and your goal. Today you might be studying but tomorrow you may not study for some reason. You have to study continuously. As exams come near, you will study more hours and put 120% effort. That’s not that’s not the right approach to go for this exam. Identifying your aptitude and your inherent strengths helps you to crack the exam in very few attempts.
TS: There are many students in UVCE who would like to know from you and get some advice. So what would you like to tell them?
SP: When I went to the felicitation ceremony organised by the Placement Office, UVCE I met a lot of students who asked me about UPSC exams and everyone felt proud. They also wanted to appear in these exams and I felt really happy because the main problem with UPSC exams is that people are not aware about essence these exams. Though they have that inherent capacity and they have all the knowledge, they are always in their comfort zone and want some job. What I want to tell them is to have a proper aim first. They have to think about why they want to come here because without a proper intent and a proper plan, they can’t execute it properly. They have to know about this exam & information is readily available on internet.
Self-discipline and self-sacrifice for certain years are needed. They need to do continuous preparation without giving any excuses. Proper guidance on how they have to approach is very essential because each stage in your preparation, as every stage is different. They have to mainly focus on improving their personality and understanding their aptitude like what are their inherent qualities and what are their strengths and focus on their weaknesses. If they correct the mistakes and if they put their steps in the right path, they will definitely clear it in very few attempts. Keep learning from failures and eventually you will succeed.
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