Syllabus of OCSE Preliminary Exam

GS Paper I
S. No. SUBJECT
1. History of India and Indian National Movement

2. Indian Polity and Governance-Constitution, Political System, Panchayati Raj,

Public Policy, Rights Issues, etc.

3. Economic and Social Development Sustainable Development, Poverty,

Inclusion, Demographics, Social Sector Initiative, etc.

4. Indian and World Geography-Physical, Social, Economic Geography of India

and the World.

5. General Science

6. General Issues on Environmental Ecology, Biodiversity and Climate Change

that do not require subject specialization.

7. Current event of National and International Importance

Paper II
S. No. Subject
1. COMPREHENSION- English Language Comprehension Skills (Class-X
level).

2. GENERAL MENTAL ABILITY- Basic numeracy, (numbers and their

relations, orders of magnitude) (Class X level)

3. DATA INTERPRETATION (Charts, Graphs, Tables, Data Sufficiency etc-

Class X level)

4. DECISION MAKING and PROBLEM SOLVING

5. LOGICAL REASONING and ANALYTICAL ABILITY

6. INTERPERSONAL SKILLS including communication skills

The Preliminary Examination is meant to serve as screening test only. The number of
candidates to be admitted to the Main examination will not be counted for determining
their final order of merit.
In the prelim’s examination, one-fourth marks assigned to that question that shall be
deducted for indicating incorrect response of each question, but no deduction of marks
from total score shall be made if no response is given to a given question.
 Syllabus of Main Examination
The Main Examination shall consist of the following papers and each paper shall be of
three hours duration.
Compulsory Papers (I, II, III, IV, and V) 1400 marks
Paper I – Odia Language 300 marks
Paper II- English 300 marks
Paper III – English Essay 200 marks
Paper IV- General Studies-I 300 marks
Paper V- General Studies II 300 marks
Optional Papers (VI, VII, VIII & IX) 1200 marks
Two subjects to be selected from the list CHECK PDF
of Optional subjects set out by the
Commission.

• Each of the Paper I (Odia Language) and Paper II (English) will be Matriculation
standard and shall be of qualifying in nature. The marks obtained in these two
papers shall not be counted for ranking.
• The papers on Essay, General Studies and Optional Subjects of only those
candidates shall be evaluated who attain such minimum standard as may be
fixed by the Commission
• The question paper other than Indian Language and literature will be conducted
in English medium.

EXAM PATTERN
The Odisha Public Service Commission conducts the OCSE in three stages:
(a) Preliminary Examination
(b) Main Examination
(c) Interview
The preliminary examination is meant to serve as screening test only. Those who
qualify prelim are allowed to appear in the Main Examination.
The prelim exam consists of two papers of OBJECTIVE TYPE (Multiple Choice
Questions) and each paper shall be of two hours duration.
Subjects Marks
General Studies Paper I 200 marks
General Studies Paper II 200 marks
 Main Examination
There are 9 papers in the Main Examination, including the ‘Compulsory papers’ and
‘Optional Papers’. Unlike the UPSC Examination OCS Examination requires two Optional
papers to appear.
Papers Marks
Compulsory Papers 1400
Paper I- Odia Language 300
Paper II- English 300
Paper III- English Essay 200
Paper IV-General Studies-I 300
Paper V- General studies-II 300
Optional Papers 1200
Paper VI 300
Paper VII 300
Paper VIII 300
Paper IX 300
Note: Paper VI, VII, VIII, & IX can be selected based on your preferences. The list of
Optional Subjects enlisted by the Commission can be downloaded from here.