Books For UPSC IAS Civil Services Examination
- Syllabus is your Bible, Quran, Gita..
- Previous 3-5 Year Question papers are your Best Friends.
- ‘Smart Hard World’ can Sail you through. Only ‘hard work’ can sink you.
- Do something that can keep you motivated. (I run this blog primarily for motivation) Love what you do or Do what you love.
- There is limitation to what human brain can store. So don’t bombard it with Facts and Stats and other Overweight Stuff. If you overburden it, it will confuse you.
- Remember this is not +2 or Degree exam. Here the syllabus is unlimited if you consider it in strict sense. But if you act smart, you can finish most of the important topics. Be practical. Its not how many pages you read, but how much you can remember and reproduce in the exam.
- Stop storing Stuff (100GB of Notes, Pendrive Course) in PC, iPhone and learn to store things in mind.
- “I will revise my notes in last 1-2 months” won’t work. Revise regularly.
- Finish Easy Topics First and Then Go for Tougher ones. [If you start with tough topics, you will end up wasting lot of time and you will not have time to complete easier ones]
- To clear prelims you need 55-60% marks (there is negative marking). So your thinking should be to keep it aggradational. 10% first month, 20 % in two months……..60-70% in six months. If you become overambitious and aim for unrealistic scores like 80-90%, you many end up overdoing things and waste lot of time.
- Take practice tests once in 2-3 months to access your preparation.
- Its not how many books you buy, but its how many books you can read.
- Don’t buy books in bulk. Buy 1-2 books, finish the topics related to the syllabus and then go for another subject or book. If you buy books in bulk, most of them will end up in your Unused Library (Cold Storage).
- Buy only one books for each topic, finish it selectively according to syllabus and only then think about buying more books.
- There are so many websites (100s) bombarding you with lot of notes (Useful + Useless + Disastrous). Stick with only few reliable websites like www.mrunal.org, www.insightsonindia.com, forumias.com etc.
In my opinion, the below mentioned books are more than enough to cover all important topics.
Always search for the latest Edition.
Some Books are available as PDFs. Search them. Don’t waste time Net Digging
By Prelims 2016, I can Promise You Geography, General Science NCERT and Environment Notes.
All NCERTs now available on Amazon
GS 1Latest Editions
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| Indian Culture | Nithin Singaniya | Amazon — Flipkart | His hand written notes is good. Book has got good feedback. It 100% exam oriented. “Benefit to Cost” Ratio is High |
| The Wonder That was India 1 | Amazon — Flipkart | Buy it only if you can read 500 pages on Indian Culture. Good Books if you are a book lover “Benefit to Cost” Ratio is low | |
| The Wonder That was India 2 | Amazon — Flipkart | ||
| Modern Indian History and Freedom Struggle | Spectrum | Amazon — Flipkart | Important For Prelims and Mains Necessary facts are given in the form of summary. Around 300 pages “Benefit to Cost” Ratio is High |
| Bipin Chandra | Amazon — Flipkart | Bad for Prelims Good For Mains answer writing. 500+ pages The book is written like a story. One needs lot of patience to read this book. “Benefit to Cost” Ratio is low | |
| Post-Independence India | Bipin Chandra | Amazon — Flipkart | Post Independence Consolidation – Only 5-6 Chapters required. Under Modern Indian History, some important events like 1962 war, Emergency, etc can be covered from this book. Written like a story Biased Towards Congress “Benefit to Cost” Ratio is High |
| Ramachandra Guha | Amazon — Flipkart | Buy BIPIN or This one. No big difference. No matter who the author is history doesn’t change | |
| Modern World History | Mastering Modern World History – Norman Lowee | Amazon — Flipkart | It starts from 1917 Pre 1917 available in NCERT (available on mrunal.org) “Benefit to Cost” Ratio is High if you study selectively |
| General topics like Indian Society, Poverty, Urbanization, etc.. | News Papers, notes here and there | ||
| Geography | My Notes OR the below books. [I have compiled notes from below books] Visit This Link: How to Study Geography General Studies UPSC IAS | ||
| Savinder Singh | Amazon — Flipkart | ||
| Spectrum Geography | Amazon — Flipkart | ||
| Certificate Physical Geography | Amazon — Flipkart | ||
| Indian Geography | Indian Geography by Kullar | Amazon — Flipkart | |
GS 2 | |||
| Indian Constitution | M Laxmikanth | Amazon — Flipkart | “Benefit to Cost” Ratio is Very High |
| DD Basu | Amazon — Flipkart | Read it after Laxmikanth if you have time | |
| India and Neighbors, International Relations | Does the Elephant Dance?: Contemporary Indian Foreign Policy | PDF available on net You don’t need a book to be frank. Most of the questions come from Current Affairs | Good Book [Not must]
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GS 3 | |||
| Indian Economy | Sanjiv Verma
| Amazon — Flipkart
| Mrunal First. Books Next Short Book “Benefit to Cost” Ratio is High |
| Ramesh Singh | Amazon — Flipkart | Big Book Compared to Sanjiv Verma Lot of unnecessary data “Benefit to Cost” Ratio is low compared to Sanjiv verma | |
| Disaster Management to Various Security Forces | Internal Security and Disaster Management By Ashok Kumar | Amazon — Flipkart
| Very Good Book It will save time Don’t do net digging for these topics |
GS 4 | |||
| Ethics | Lexicon Ethics | Amazon — Flipkart | For Basic understanding visit mrunal.org “Benefit to Cost” Ratio is ok |
Prelims | |||
| Topic | Book/Books | Links | Comments |
| All Environment GK
Atlas | TMH Shankar Ias Lucent’s GK
Oxford School Atlas | Amazon — Flipkart
| For Practice and Revision Selective study Helps you brush up you GK. [Trivial facts of all subjects at one place]
Not requited if you are comfortable with Google Maps |