How to study for Preliminary Test (PT)?

How to study for Preliminary Test (PT)?

PT is based on GS and CSAT. GS is a vast area to study. For a beginner who is aspiring for qualifying this prestigious exam, it's very important that he or she must start with basics. For basics one must go for basic general knowledge from various sources available in the market. Many says that one must go for NCERT books for clearing basic concepts. That is also a good option. But most of the candidate do not read NCERT and it look boring to cover all small books from class 6th to 12th. The other option is Arihant Basic General Knowledge books written by Tarun Goyal or Manohar Panday, Lucent's General Knowledge book. These books are also the excellent material for clearing General Knowledge. Next is where from we get our Current Affairs. The most important source is Daily News Paper (The Hindu or The Times of India). Reading Daily News article and news items not only will enhance your General Knowledge but also English Vocabulary and other skills. It's very important to note important news items in a notebook and prepare quick reversion Notes.
Other important source of Current affair are online platforms like Insight IAS current affairs Monthly magazine or Visionias Monthly Magazine or Unacademy. You need not go to different sources at a time. Choose one or two sources you like to read. Mixing different sources will create mess in your mind and it will also waste your precious time.
For Jammu and Kashmir General knowledge, the best source is Arihant J&K General Knowledge by Abdul Rashid.
Or you may take other sources together as per your choice.

For CSAT you may buy any book regarding CSAT Which is common for IAS and KAS preparation.

Rest it's very important to go for previous Question papers from where you will get an idea about the type of questions and difficulty level of the question papers asked. And accordingly you may start your preparation. At the beginning you will face problems but slowly and gradually you will come to the track. One important thing is to test yourself regularly. Say if you start today then see the old paper and read it thoroughly and try to solve the questions. Note down the number of questions you solved. Then close the paper and start preparing. After one month take the same old paper and begin to solve questions again. Do it several times. The day will come you will be able to solve more questions then previous time. This will not only enhance your knowledge but also will boost you up every time you solve more questions.

It's very important to note that you must study for mains exams togather with the preparation for PT also. Once you study all basics of General Knolwdge and CSAT, it become easy to collaborate the preparation for Mains exam and PT togather.

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