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KANISHAK KATARIA
AIR 1 - UPSC CSE 2018

BOOKLIST, READING REFERENCES AND NOTES

MAKING
APPROACH
▸ Do not chase reading materials. Biggest blunder you can commit.

▸ Keep limited sources which you can revise.

▸ Revision is THE KEY. Revise 1 book 10 times instead of reading 10 books once.

▸ Use internet constructively to fill any gaps.

▸ Most important is to STAY CONFIDENT in the material which you have read. Do not get perturbed by
what others say or read.
NOTE MAKING AND REVISION
▸ Can be done offline or online or mix as per your convenience.

▸ Do not try to make the perfect notes. Do what makes sense to you, unless you want to sell the notes
later!

▸ It is advisable to switch to written notes after prelims. It will help you in writing practice.

▸ Writing / typing by oneself is very important. It is ACTIVE learning and information gets registered in
the brain for longer. It helps in easy retrieval later.

▸ Try to have short notes ready just before Mains for LMR (Last Minute Revision).

▸ Short notes should only contain KEYWORDS which will help in faster revision.

▸ Time taken to revise should reduce with each successive iteration.

▸ Reverse Learning from test series solutions is also crucial. Update the notes if you encounter
something new / interesting.
MY BOOKLIST
GS1
▸ History:

▸ Art and Culture: Only class notes + Test series learning

▸ Didn’t have enough time to focus on it

▸ Modern India: NCERT (old), Spectrum, Class notes

▸ World: Class notes, NCERT 9th and 10th, Few topics from Vision supplementary material

▸ Post Independence: Class notes + 12th Polity NCERT

▸ Society:

▸ Class notes, Sociology NCERT 12th, Vision Mains 365

▸ Geography:

▸ NCERT 11th and 12th, Class notes

▸ Physical: Mrunal Rajtanil slides

▸ Resource distribution: Mrunal slides (no videos) + Anudeep Sir’s notes (only for filling gaps)

▸ Pmfias, India-WRIS and other internet sources for specific readings

GS2
▸ Polity:

▸ NCERT 11th, Class notes

▸ Laxmikanth, Vision Mains 365

▸ Governance:

▸ Class notes, Vajiram materials (few topics)

▸ Test series reverse learning

▸ Social Justice: Vision Mains 365

▸ International Relations:

▸ Class notes, Newspapers

▸ Selected regions from Mains 365

GS3
▸ Economics:

▸ Macroeconomics 12th NCERT, Class notes

▸ Sriram Booklet (not end to end), Mains 365, Internet sources like Arthpedia, Vikaspedia etc

▸ Agriculture: Only class notes + Internet references

▸ Environment:

▸ Biology 12th NCERT (last 4 chapters), Mains 365, Specific topics from Shankar, Rest from Internet

▸ Science and Technology: Class notes, Mains 365

▸ Security:

▸ Class notes, Mains 365

▸ Internal Security by Ashok Kumar IPS (limited reading)

▸ Disaster Management:

▸ Class notes, Vision supplementary material, Test series reverse learning

GS4
▸ Class notes

▸ Filling gaps from Vajiram yellow book

▸ All previous UPSC case studies

▸ Point wise coverage of each syllabus keyword

▸ Test series reverse learning

*All class notes refer to Vajiram class notes made by self

*Test series reverse learning refers to Vision Mains Test series.

READING NCERTS
▸ Cover depending on availability of time and confidence in the subject.

▸ Lower classes can be skipped if you can understand from senior class books directly.

▸ Few NCERTs are specifically recommended:

▸ Geography 11th and 12th - no need to refer any other book

▸ Polity - 11th (Indian Constitution at Work)

▸ Macroeconomics - 12th

▸ Sociology - 12th

▸ Other NCERTs can be done as per convenience

▸ Try to have short summaries / notes ready for each chapter instead of going through the whole book
again while revising.