13 Mistakes in JKAS/ IAS Preliminary Examination/ to be avoided.

Preliminary Test is the first stage in competitive Examination of JKAS or IAS. Now JKPSC also have adopted similar pattern of examination to that of UPSC. 

Preliminary test comprises of two Papers. One is General Studies and other CSAT.

In this article we are going to discuss what are the major mistakes which candidates do in the Preliminary Test of JKAS or IAS.

We have enlisted some of the common mistakes done in PT as bellow.

1.Reaching Late in the Examination Hall.

At least reach15 minutes before the examination begins. It relaxes the mind and the body. Reaching late in the examination hall will create a mental pressure as you have to fill up the details like Roll numbers, Date of examination, centre code, signature on the OMR sheet before the examination starts and this take at least 5 to 7 mintures. And if you are reaching 15 minutes earlier in the examination hall, you take 5 mintues to relax the mind and your body and then you may fill up all details easily and comfortably without any pressure.
If you are late and you have to fill all the details hurriedly in pressure which invites mistakes in filling up of the detials. For example you may fill a wrong roll number on the OMR sheet or any other mistake. Further you become short of time for starting the question paper. So try to leave early from home to reach the examination centre as early as possible.

2. Not Checking of Accessories Needed.

You are allowed only few articles inside the examination hall like Pencil, Pens, Erasor, Wrist Watch, Water bottle, Mask, etc. Check all the items to be carried before going for the Examination Hall. Take extra pens with you. Wrist Watch is the most important thing you must carry with you. Each second is important. Frequently eye over the watch so that you may manage time efficiently. Take water bottle, because going outside for drinking water is a time wastage. 

3. Guessing the Answers. 

Believing in luck? Many students have the habbit of guessing the answers in the examination hall. It is total blunder if you are trying in Preliminary Test. It is certain that the accuracy level of guessed answers is only less than 10 percent.  If you are not able to decide the  answer of a particular question, do not guess it but leave and move to the next question. Guessing and hence marking wrong answers will invite the negative marking and hence no chance of qualification.

 4. Attempting the Questions Randomly.

There should be perfect and disciplined way of attempting the questions in Preliminary Test. As there are two papers one is GS and the other is CSAT. Both Papers needs different stratagies for attempting the questions.
For GS paper there are a total of 100 question each carrying 2 marks. It also have negative marking. Start reading questions in a sequence from question 1 to question 100. Leave a question which you are not sure to be answered correct. Some people make a rough answer marking on question paper itself and mark answers in OMR at the end of Examination. Do not do this. Either mark Answer on OMR sheet with pencil or directly mark the answer on OMR sheet with a pen.
Steps.
• Read the question
• Choose answer
• Check the Question number in Question paper.
• Ensure you are marking the same question number in OMR sheet.
• Mark with Pencil or Pen.

5. Marking Answers by using a Lead Pencil.

 This is a good choice because it has an adventage that if you find an answer marked wrongly later on on OMR sheet, you can rub the wrongly marked answer and re-mark the correct answer. But at the same time pencil marking has a disadventage of wastage of time. Because at the end you have to mark all answers with a Ball Point Pen. If you are able to manage time and keep about 10 minutes spare for marking With pen then its ok. Otherwise Mark directly with the Pen without using any Pencil.

6. Attempting large no. of CSAT Questions.

 Since you know it is only the qualifying nature of Paper. So you have to attempt only minimum questions with 100 percent accuracy to get qualified. The minimum no. of questions of CSAT to be attempted is 27 questions out of total 80 questions but with 100 percent accuracy. No issue you may go upto 35 questionswith at most 99 percent accuracy. Negative marking is not tolerated in CSAT.

Now there is very important stretagy how to find these 35 question which you can easily do.
If you start from Page 1 and keep solving the questions, it is possible that the you will attempt 35 questions within first 40 or 50 questions and later on you turned the last pages of the question paper and find that there were some very easy questions on the last pages.
So stretagy is that start from question 1 to 40 from page 1 and then shift to last page and start reading questions from question 80 to question 41. This will save your time in finding those easy 35 questions. Because you only have to attempt 35 questions accurately. So why to attempt and waste time in solving hard question. Its better to explore whole paper from both ends and find the easiest 35 questions in a short time.

 7. Not Marking the questions you have answered.

You have to note the question you  attemtped. Start from page 1. Mark the question which you have attempted with a letter "D" for Done and mark the question which you have left pending with a letter "P" for attempting later on. Leave the rest of questions unmarked which you do not want to attempt at all. Although writing on question paper is not allowed but you can write in smaller fonts. This will help you in finding the questions you have attempted when you revist the question paper again. If you randomly attempt the questions and do not mark, it will be very difficult to find what you have attempted and what was left.

8. Marking Wrong Option despite knowing the answer.

Sometimes a candidate mark wrong option on the OMR sheet despite knowing the right answer. This is due to the reason that the candidate do not take the marking of answer seriously or so carefully or we can say the candidate do silly mistake.
For example you attempted question no. 20 and its right answer is option B. The candidate hurridly mark the option C without any reconfirming the answer. You can save yourself from such mistake by taking time to see the option. Ensure that you are going to mark right option at least twice.
Secondly there is another silly mistake done by the candidate. For example the candidate is attempting question no. 20 and he or she knows the answer is option B. But while marking on the OMR sheet, the candidate wrongly mark option B of Question no. 21. This is because in the OMR sheet, the Question numbers are found very close to each other and if one is careless or do things hurridly, such mistakes are common and the candidates may loose marks. So be carefull in doing such silly mistake. Ensure the marking right answer at least two time before marking.

9. Overthinking and Overconfidance.

Some candidates are Overconfident and attempt question so fast that they fall pray of negative marking. Overconfidance is a negative energy inside you. Do not make Overconfidance control yourself. Some time overthinking also become problem. There are some simple questions with simple answers, but candidate thinks that how such a simple question may be asked by the examiner?, so he or she overthinks and mark wrong answer while attempting the question. So avoid these two things to avoid negative marking.

 10. Not looking at watch.

This is the most important thing in your examination hall to do. Frequently watch on your wrist watch so that you may know how much time has passed and how much time you have now to complete the task. For GS paper, there are 100 questions and 2 hours or 120 minutes to solve the questions. So divide your time by no. of questions, you may find the time required to solve 1 question.
120min/100qs. means 120×60=7200 seconds. So 7200/100 = 72 seconds.
So you have to solve 1 question in 72 seconds.
But you know that there is a negative marking, so you are not going to solve each and every question. On an average, if you are able to solve at least 65 question with 100 percent accuracy, you may find your name in list for appearing in Mains examination, so you have to take whole 2 hours time for solving only 65 question but with 100 or 99 percent accuracy. So divide your time 7200 (2 Hours) seconds with 65 questions which comes nearly to 116 seconds, approximately 2 mintues per question.
For CSAT, as already discussed if you are able to solve only 35 question with at least 99 percent accuracy, you are able to qualify the paper, so divide 7200 with 35 questions which comes nearly to 205 second per question or we can say 3.4 minutes per question. So constantly look on your watch and maintain the time taken per question.

 11. Not Reading the question carefully.

You read it hurriedly and miss important points as a result of which you have to read the same question twice or thrice to understand which is going to waste your time. Read so slowly and so carefully that you take only one attempt for question reading to understood the question. It will definitely save your time. Its further instructed that reading too slowing is also a wastage of time. So maintain the balance. Your vocabulary also matters a lot how fast you understand a given question. So build your vocabulary simultaneously during your preparation for IAS/JKAS examination. You may develop your vocab by reading more books and news papers.

 12. Sticking to same question if not able to solve.

Sometimes a candidate starts solving a particular question but fails to solve in first attempt. Then he or she tries another attempt but again fails and give 3rd attempt. Do not do this in your Preliminary Test. Know the value of Time. Do not waste time on the same question if you are not able to solve in first attempt. Leave the question and move ahead. Mark this question for attemtping at the last moment.

13  Attempting less or more no. of Questions(in case of CSAT Paper).

You should know that CSAT is just a qualifying paper and you must know the limit of your attempting the questions. You only need to score 66 marks for qualification.  Do not attempt too less number of questions that you can not even get qualified and at the same time do not attempt more questions by guessing the answers.
Calculations.
If your accuracy is 100 percent, then you only needs 27 out of 80 questions to be attempted for Qualification of CSAT paper as 27×2.5=67.5.
But no one can perform with 100 percent accuracy in the examination owing to the various factors like preparation, exam pressure, time management, etc. So you need to devise a limit for your attempting the questions. You may perform with 90 to 95 percent accuracy in this examination. This means that you can attempt about 35 out of 80 questions in CSAT.
Why not to go beyond 35 ? Why needed ? You just need 66 marks for qualification so why to score more. Why not to invest your full energy and 2 hours time to solve only 35 questions?
One attempting 50 question in the same 2 hours of time will required more energy than one attempting only 35 questions in the same time period. It will increase your accuracy level also because you have enough per question time.

Hope you have taken some good take away from this article. We are here to guide you for this examination.
Thanks and visit us to know more about Competitive Examination.