Since optional constitutes 500/2025 towards the merit list, it is important to outperform in it to get into a service of your choice. Hence I spent considerable time in picking up my optional paper. I had a passing interest in Geography (as I am good with maps) and a strong interest in International Relations. I briefly considered Management optional because it mirrored my graduation syllabus.
I eventually decided to go with Political Science and International Relations (PSIR) for these 3 reasons:
(a) significant overlap with GS papers – polity, international relations, ethics, et al
(b) availability of reading material and notes
(c) subject had helped many people secure top 100 ranks in recent years.
I was helped in reaching this decision by reading the strategy of AIR 16 (2014) and AIR 67 (2016)
If there’s one stop, single source reading material for PSIR, it is Shubhra Ranjan madam’s notes. By reading the strategy of the two people I mentioned above, I decided to not bother with any other reading material. I found some of the notes online in August 2017 and spent a couple of months reading through them (Paper I and Paper II Part A) by devoting 2-3 hours a day. I had also ordered Pax Indica by Shashi Tharoor (read once, never picked up again) and Does the Elephant Dance by David Malone (used to prepare notes after prelims but was written in 2010 hence a bit outdated) around the same time to get a sense of Paper II Part B.
However, instead of focusing on reading the material of optional along with prelim prep, I decided to go all in for prelims somewhere in early November (full 7 months before prelims). I had concluded that there’s no mains or optional to study for if I don’t clear prelims. At that point I was also worried that I won’t be able to complete my GS syllabus by February end. I wanted at least 3 months before prelims for full revisions and decided to sacrifice my optional study time. Again, this was a calculated risk as preparing PSIR from ground up after prelims and scoring even 300+ was not unheard of.
Resources
After I realised that I will clear prelims in all probability, I ordered the original notes that Shubhra Ranjan madam’s website delivers. (I was later told I could have gotten them at 1/5 price! But I have pirated enough PC games in this lifetime to know when one should pay the developer). I didn’t join her classroom coaching as:
(a) I didn’t think I had time and energy to commute to classes (I live in Noida)
(b) The notes are self-explanatory and I could understand basic concepts
(c) For everything else there’s internet – plato.standford.edu is great if you can handle the complexity, but only for understanding any thinker’s original ideas. Crash Course Philosophy is informative and fun. Articles from ORF, Indian Express, Foreign Policy cover aspects of dynamic sections of Paper II.
(d) I have been a backbencher and usually sleep in classrooms 🙂
I finally ended up preparing the syllabus with the following resources, I also googled whatever I didn’t understand easily:
- Paper I Part A – Shubhra madam’s notes only
- Paper I Part B – Shubhra madam’s notes only. Revised Laxmikant once as well to cover topics in the syllabus + read relevant GS-2 current affairs again
- Paper II Part A – Shubhra madam’s notes only + own notes
- Paper II Part B – selective Shubhra madam’s notes + Does the Elephant Dance by David Malone + own notes (from Foreign Policy, ORF website (absolutely the best for India’s foreign relations and quoting renowned scholars), the Economist, Indian Express are my favorites). I ended up with extensive notes of my own for this entire part. Filed under PSIR -> India and World
All of my notes are here:
Paper II Part A is here: Comparative and IP pdf
Paper II Part B is here: India and the World pdf
It can also be accessed online, see Notes tab. Some topics are not directly in notes (such as peacekeeping), I must have either read madam’s notes or googled it last minute.
Reading and revising
I decided that for maximum retention and greater recall value in exam hall, I would need at least 5 revisions. Since this optional would require me to think less on my feet (unlike GS), and more on what I read and remember, I decided to make short notes based on madam’s notes. I did it for entire book notes except Paper II Part B. This is what it looked like:
This is how my readings went after prelims:
- Mid June to July end 2018 – first reading and scribbling of the notes (image above). This was done in detail and by devoting 4-5 hours to the optional every day. My primary concern was understanding concepts and not trying to retain information.
- August 2018 – one reading every fortnight; I would read the book notes along with the sticky notes. I actively tried to retain ideas and thinkers/scholars.
- September 2018 – one reading every ten days; I would read the book notes along with the sticky notes but much faster than I did in August. I challenged myself by randomly trying to remember information/idea/thinker from the sticky notes. I must have finished with these 5 readings a week before the first mains paper, the Essay.
- Week between GS and optional – I read only from the sticky notes, trying to remember key words for every subtopic. I had color coded the sticky notes by topics, hence over course of 5 readings and final revision, I could locate any topic in my mind (by thinking where it was on the wall – poor man’s mind palace maybe?)
Answer writing for PSIR
I had no time for answer writing for the optional as I was spending my other half of the day revising GS and writing GS+Essay mocks. However, I had taken some time out to study answers of past toppers of PSIR; madam’s notes has a dedicated book of sample answer writing (Book 5b I think). I got the general sense of how to go about writing an answer in the optional:
For concept/idea based questions:
1. Who theorised it and inspirations behind it if any
2. Core points explaining the idea, include diagram/flowchart (rare, only if it helps)
3. Arguments for and against the idea, citing scholars
4. Relevance in present times / critical analysis
For current affairs based questions:
1. A generic opening surrounding the event/news, a quote if I could remember one
2. Core points explaining the situation
3. Explain for and against arguments, citing scholars
4. Critical analysis / pragmatic opinion or solution, citing scholars if needed
This is the general template I decided to follow, unless the question asked for a one-sided argument. This gave me a sense of structure to follow and I walked into exam hall with zero answer writing practice for optional (not recommended) but some confidence.
Quoting scholars and thinkers:
For paper I and half of Paper II, I didn’t try finding or reading scholars outside of what were provided in madam’s notes. I tried to remember only a couple of them for every topic (and over multiple revisions) and was in a position to recall them in the exam hall, since I didn’t try to remember 5-7 for every point of view.
For Paper II Part B, I googled books involving – India’s its foreign policy or bilateral relations – to quote in answers. I found their reviews and added them my notes. I could, then, quote an array of books without actually having ever read them. Building my notes from ORF also meant I could quote Harsh V Pant and Manoj Joshi liberally on any India specific current affairs question.
For example, Avinash Paliwal’s My Enemy’s Enemy and Anatol Lieven’s Pakistan: A Hard Country were used to back my arguments in a question about India-Afghanistan-Pakistan. I quoted Schaffer and Schaffer’s India at the Global High Table on a question about India’s foreign policy. Milan Vaishnav’s When Crime Pays found its place in my answer on political personalities. I could quotes views of a few thinkers such as Stephen Walt and Robert Kagan without explicitly adding them to my notes (reading Foreign Policy off my Facebook feed since college). I also defaulted to David Malone’s Does the Elephant Dance as I had based my notes on India and its relations with important countries on this book. And if there was no one else to quote, there was Raja Mandala 🙂
Attaching pdf of my last minute notes I had made for thinkers and scholars, and hot topics from optional perspective (some of this I merged with full fledged notes, see pdf above, while revising)
In the exam hall
In the exam hall, the divine principles are:
1. Finish the whole paper (I almost succeeded, but in the second paper I messed up my time management, ended up leaving a ten marker and couldn’t conclude another ten marker). Pick the questions you are going to write the moment you get the paper, it helps you think about what you have to write beforehand.
2. Optional paper requires you to come across as an expert of the field with considerable depth of knowledge. Try to retain names of scholars and thinkers as much as possible. I could cite 2-4 scholars in every answer I wrote, using the techniques mentioned above.
3. Interlink your answers with other concepts in political science/international relations. This can only come by understanding concepts inside out and making a conscious effort to include them in your answers. For example, in Trump-Kim question I talked about how structural realism is the reason behind current geopolitical tensions between the USA-DPRK. In an answer analysing USA-China rivalry, I specifically talked about complex interdependence.
4. Paragraphs over bullet points, you need to come across as an expert. Write as if you are writing an editorial, except your deadline arrives every 7 to 12 minutes.
I received 283/500 marks in optional (Paper I – 144, Paper II – 139). It’s not that great considering there are many who got 300+, but I don’t think I should complain 🙂
Only in hindsight, I can call this a “strategy”. Nonetheless, it worked for me. Hope reading this helps you figure out a successful strategy for yourself.
English, Agastya 
Hey DJ. Been a follower of your blog for the past 1 year. Actually, I have PSIR optional (Studied Part 1-A till now, thought of doing after Prelims- FAILED) but I recently went through topper answer copies, and the way they wrote their answers with the Complicated Jargons and whatnot scared the shit out of me.
Although I liked the subject, now I am seriously considering changing my optional (I don’t think I will be able to write in that style).
1. Is it mandatory to use jargon to fetch good marks?
2. Did you compare your answers with Toppers one in optional?
3. Did you consider Sociology as optional at that time? If yes, then why didn’t finalized it.
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1. Do not think so, stick to the concepts and terms you study in the notes (+quote scholars)
2. No, I didn’t write mocks for optional as I was short on time. But I did try go through some of the topper answer copies (which were not THAT complicated but they wrote 5 years ago now so don’t maybe times have changed)
3. No didn’t consider
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Hello sir ! I have this doubt if i opt for IFS , is it compulsory having background in political science and international relations? Because neither i have background in political science and nor my optional is same.
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No
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Sir pls can you elaborate on how to use this StanfordPlato site bcoz the info. given here regarding any thinker is too vast covering his history & all his works. So how to extract the useful info for understanding the original idea as you said?
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Like I said, if you want to understand/curious about the original ideas, which also means that you have the time to read the elaborate info given. I must have used it only for a couple of concepts (definitely Plato’s allegory of the cave) before realising I don’t have time. However, I found it to be incredibly interesting, hence mentioned here.
UPSC is perfectly fine you writing dumbed down versions of it that you will find in notes and give you 300+
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hey Dhananjay, many congratulations for your success, i have 2 queries from you,
1. i have already completed my PSIR once, now i am looking to complete all extra books for IR and ideologies, am i supposed to make notes from these books, will that be a productive task?
2. your did your graduation in Bcom hons but choose PSIR as optional, did anyone in interview ask for for this choice? if not then what would be the good answer for this.
thanks in advance.
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1. Why do you want to complete extra books? Same material padh ke jyada marks aa jayenge (if you are reading the right material that is)
2. They didn’t ask. Interest hai is the honest answer.
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Sir I have subhra mam notes of 2016 , should I buy new.
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Better to look at new notes and compare before buying. Don’t think the static part (2/3 of syllabus) evolves too much. If you’re dependent on current affairs also on madam’s notes, you can consider buying latest notes
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Sir i have taken PSIR as optional and joined in subhra mam’s online class for appearing in 2021. So as given by many other toppers do you feel the necessity to read OP gauba. If so which all chapters do you recommend?
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Never read OP Gauba so wouldn’t know. What I read is already detailed here.
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I hv also joined the same 🙂
Let’s hope for best 🙅
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@eresrinivi8
What’s your review of the tablet course? Is it worth 59 K?
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No idea what a tablet course is, but 59k is a lot of money
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Hi sir, I wanted to know that how you kept yourself motivated for this journey,I am a beginner I use to prepare for 3 days nicely then slack ,this slacking arouses anxiety in me that it feels I should quit preparation.
I study for 8 hours ( including 2 hour newspaper) at home, I have not joined any coaching …I don’t know why I feel like I am not studying fully…I mostly miss my target for the day. ,These thoughts just intimidate me a lot.
What do you do to keep going?
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Don’t slack and don’t miss your targets for the week. As a beginner it’s okay to slack a bit but don’t distract yourself from the larger aim of finishing your syllabus on time. Consistency in everything you do is necessary.
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Hi sir, I wanted to know that how you kept yourself motivated for this journey,I am a beginner I use to prepare for 3 days nicely then slack ,this slacking arouses anxiety in me that it feels I should quit preparation.
I study for 8 hours ( including 2 hour newspaper) at home, I have not joined any coaching …I don’t know why I feel like I am not studying fully…I mostly miss my target for the day. ,These thoughts just intimidate me a lot.
What do you do to keep going?
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Don’t slack. Don’t overthink.
(Both these things will anyway happen, and that’s why this exam is also a test of your mental fortitude)
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Slack and overthink in rest of 14-16 hours of the day. Aim for 8-10 hours of quality study at least 6 days a week.
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Respected Sir ,
First of all Thank you very much for this amazing blog (Aatma Nirbhar guide 🙂 ).
Sir I would like to ask that I have decided to take PSIR as an optional. So my doubt is that should I first prepare GS-2 polity or I should directly read PSIR that will eventually cover the GS-2 Polity portion. So which part should I start first GS-2 Polity or PSIR Optional?
Please do reply!
Thanks in advance.
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I ready GS2 polity, not by choice but by design. I would say it becomes much easier if you do GS2 polity well first
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Sir I have notes of 2018 of postal course will that suffice 2021 preparation or do i need to buy new postal course notes ? Thanks in advance
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Except for paper 2 part B, should be alright I guess. Most of that content is static in nature.
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Hey Dhananjay,
First of all, I would like to take a movement to appreciate your patience and efforts to help others climb this huge mountain of UPSC goal. Not everyone have a heart to do that.
Coming to my question, if you still have a copy, could you please upload your first practice test for mains? This will give us an insight on how much we can improve gradually in answer writing given no body will be satisfied enough with his first test as they say. Also, as we know how much effort you have put in, we will know if we have to push more that you did.
Cheers for an amazing journey you are headed to and all the best. 🙂
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I have now uploaded all the Insights mocks I took, starting with an essay late July. (You will find them under Mains as well as Notes tab). By then I had written 4-5 essays and had done a month of one hour daily answer writing.
I tried finding the very first essay/answer I wrote but I don’t have a soft copy of it and now I don’t know if the heaps of my A4 answer sheets are still around back home.
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I am confused between History and PSIR. What do you suggest to opt as an optional given that I have no background on both the subjects and a good amount of interest in some topics from both. (Liked the World history and pre and post colonial history part from history optional and the IR part from PSIR).
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I have no background of history optional so I’ll obviously recommend PSIR haha
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Sir Pls tell me how do I cut short madam’s notes to make my own very crisp notes for multiple revision purposes? Bcoz it not possible to memorize everything from Madam’s notes & I think reading from short notes will help me memorize things better which will help in writing answers. So sir pls tell how do I make such notes.
Btw this is my second reading and I am appearing for 2021. Thanking you
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1. Cut down sentences down to bare bone ideas
2. Keep nothing that is common sense, can be read between the lines
3. While making/revising short notes, keep reading original notes along with it so you do not forget the context
4. Remember your own short notes will actually help you only in last two readings maybe and while answer writing.
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Hello sir ,Is it necessary to take psir as a optional subject to get a IFS CADRE sir
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You can take any subject you want
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Were reading the notes sufficient or did you ever feel the need to take the class for a better understanding? Also, are current affairs covered scrupulously in her notes?
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1. Didn’t feel the need to take a class for better understanding
2. Current affairs are covered quite alright. However even if you get the latest notes, around 3 months you’ll have to do on your own (it might be updated in google drive pdfs but that’s something I didn’t really look at)
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sir, i want to purchase madam notes (original) pls tell me that how i get these notes courier to my home & at what price ?
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Check on her website or call the institute.
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sir if i put ifs as 1st preference then interviewers are gonna ask alots of question IR kya because my optional is sociology
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They may ask a lot of IR questions, they may not. There’s no guarantee
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Sir can you please answer my query how much editorials information to extract when we already have current affairs magazine?
And in general studies paper does upsc expect only general asnwers like eg an ordinary person also knows how to protect environment? Then what is so special an UPSC aspirant should do… Is it mentioning of technical terms, laws, rules, regulatory bodies, court judgements etc?
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Hi Dhananjay, Regarding PSIR Optional any tips for topics under IIB – 3. I&SA – Impediments to Regional Co-op (4 Sub Topics)? And for IIB – Recent Dev. in IFP – India’s Position? Went through your notes but notes for these topics were not included — Hence the question.
One more question, How did you deal with few topics which were not in Shubhra Ma’am’s notes — such as CMEA, World Capitalist Economy?
Thank You for being active even 1 year after your selection and replying to each and every comment.
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1. Because those get covered when you do the neighbourhood and the bilateral India-x relationship.
River water disputes – India/Pak IWT, India/Bangla Teesta etc. Illegal cross border migration – Bangladesh mainly. Ethnic conflicts & insurgencies – Pakistan, SL, Myanmar, Bangladesh too earlier. Border disputes – Pak & China. You won’t need to cover them specifically.
2. Think I must have read it on Wikipedia/Google couple of days before. Some topics such as CMEA are really outdated and haven’t seen questions on those in eons. Thankfully the choice to pick questions in optional can be used to your advantage here.
3. I will get to retire once the new cohort get selected in a couple of months haha
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Haha! Indeed! “The old order changeth yielding place to the new”. Will pick up the baton one day ;). Thanks!
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I’m afraid I don’t have these notes anymore except for what is already here on this blog
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Dhananjay, I could not find ‘Sample Answers in 5b’ in Shubhra Madam’s notes. I recently subscribed the Postal Correspondence course.
Is there any other source you’d like to recommend to understand about PSIR answer writing?
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If you bought the correspondence course, they will also share a google drive link. That should have sufficient sample answers material to begin with.
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Sir…as you have said you have made own notes apart from Mam’s notes for paper 2. From where did you have made those notes??
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A lot of googling of keywords of sub-topics. Mostly from articles published on reputable sites.
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Hello sir I have seen your wall for which specicif part do u made these notes for or for whole syllabus
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Everything except Paper 2 Part B
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Sir, Heartful congratulations on your success.
This is a request, if you could provide some more zoomed in images of the PSIR notes that you have pasted on the wall…This is to have a basic idea on note making for PSIR.
Thanks in advance Sir.
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I’m afraid I don’t have these notes anymore except for what is already here on this blog
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when did u start ur optional preparations?
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I had done a cursory reading of Paper 1 notes of Shubhra Ranjan madam in Aug-Oct 2017.
I picked the optional properly in mid-June 2018 and wrote the mains in first week Oct 2018.
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did you write any test series for the optional?
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No, didn’t have the time for that. I was still finishing syllabus in September. First answer I wrote was in the exam hall, not recommended 🙂
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First of all congratulations and thanks alot for such detailed and well elaborated article on PSIR optional. You cleared all my doubts in a one go. 🙂
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Congratulations!
A fellow B.Com(H) graduate from SRCC here! Read that you chose PSIR over Management. Why didn’t you consider Commerce?
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1. Management has no overlap with rest of the syllabus
2. Fragmented study material
3. Zero interest in the subject after graduating lolol
Same also holds true for Commerce and Accountancy.
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Sir, I am reading man’s notes , understanding it but when the question comes infront of me…,it seems that ideas are very scattered to answer the questions.Remember only some points…that too not in a sequence…How to deal with this??? Thanking you
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You will need to read and revise a lot before you start solving questions. I would suggest finish 2-3 intensive readings of the entire syllabus as that’s what is needed at bare minimum before the interlinking of ideas starts happening in your head.
If you must go through questions for better understanding, read the toppers’ answers booklet/pdf. I knew I would get anxiety if I read standalone questions so I rarely did.
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Sir now Subhra mam notes aren’t available on her website, and I purchase her notes from Old RN market for Rs 1000 but I am still in dilemna whether I am going on right path or not with these market notes?
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Ask any PSIR optional student (who has attended class or has original notes from somewhere) that you know/ can find through online forums that can help you out
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can you tell me from where can I buy Shubhra Madam’s notes? live away from Delhi so how can I get them couriered?
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From her official website. They courier it to your address (takes 7-10 days to arrive)
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Hey dhananjaya, I just wanna knw that did you made additions to ma’am’s notes from reffering to some other book or just stook with those notes? Here I am preparing and I am tending to make more additions, so is her notes sufficient or not?
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I made some notes for Paper II A, and own notes completely for Paper II B.
For Paper I A & B, I stuck with madam’s notes largely, I added only minor stuff for better understanding.
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Hye Dhananjay, Let me Congratulate You on your Grand Success. Just wanted to know how to cover the WPT & IPT of Paper 1. Covering Shubra Mam notes are enough or do I need to refer anything extra as mentioned by some other toppers. Please Help. Thanks
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I did it only through Shubhra madam’s notes. I would google here and there if I had trouble understanding a concept, but no other reading material.
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For paper 1 part B
You didn’t make any notes of scholars view or it imp only for paper 2 part B?
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I stuck with scholars from madam’s notes. I didn’t go out of my way to come up with new scholars for Paper I.
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Is correspondence course of Subhra Ma’am worth it?
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I found it to be worth it. I kept hearing about how the photocopy of notes are of bad quality. The scanned copies (of photocopy notes) with which I did the first reading confirmed it.
Since I was also starting my optional after prelims, I didn’t want the hassle of worrying about the sequence/missing pages/quality, so went for the original ones.
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Can you share them with me?
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can you elaborate “when to pay the developers and when to pirate”
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I was referring to my PC gaming days when I used to pirate games. People generally (but not always) pirate games because they cannot afford it. But if and when they do have the money, they should ethically be paying for it.
I was using the same analogy for madam’s notes. I believe that if you can afford it, you should pay for it.
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Sir, the link for the notes you provided for paper 2 is not opening.
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I had no trouble opening it, can you re-check?
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ya I think it was my network problem.
Thank you
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Congrats on your success! And the wall with all the sticky notes is a beauty. But, how do you read it without straining your eyes?
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It’s not as small as it seems. https://1drv.ms/u/s!Ap1DARh0hNp6g3_4HqtHQw4YNsA6
Plus zooming into a wall is relatively easy while reading.
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Oh, I see. Thanks 🙂
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