UPSC Polity Preparation : Fundamental Duties 5.1

Introduction

• Moral obligations of all citizens to help promote a spirit of patriotism and to uphold the unity of India.
• Rights and duties of citizens are correlative and inseparable.
•  Even if not mentioned explicitly, they are presumed and are implicit.
• Not a part of original constitution but made an indispensable part of it by 42nd CAA, 1976. 
• Not removed by the 43rd and 44th CAA, 1978.
• Increased to 11 by 86th CAA, 2002.
• Inspired from the USSR constitution.
• Citizen's exercise of their rights and freedoms was inseparable from the performance of their duties and obligations. 
• It helps in furthering our interest and integrate our composite culture.
• Not mentioned explicitly by most democracies like USA and France.
• Japan is one of the few countries that mentions it explicitly.
• Fundamental Duties are also in:

1. Universal declaration of Human Rights.
2. International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

Swaran Singh Committee Recommendations

• Made recommendations on fundamental duties (8 eventually 10, now 11)
• Need felt during the operation of the internal emergency(1975-77)
• 42nd CAA, 1976, Part 4A, Article 51A
• Citizens should be aware of FDs while they enjoy FRs
• If citizens do not follow/violate these FDs, penalty and punishment can be imposed by the parliament.
• No JR of such law giving force to FD.
• Make duty to pay taxes a FD.

Criticisms

• Not exhaustive
• Vague, ambiguous and difficult to understand by layman.
• Superfluous, code of moral percepts as they are non-justiciable in character.
• Conscientious citizens will perform them anyway.
• Why an appendage to Part IV, wny not keep them in Part III

Significance

• Not enforceable but held obligatory to all citizens by the SC.
• Reminder that citizens have duties towards India, society and fellow brethrer.
• Strong deterrent to antisocial and anti national activities,
• Source of inspiration,
• Realization of the true potential of this nation.
• Help courts in determining the constitutional validity of the law.

Laws giving effect to FD

• RTE, 2009
• Preventions of Insults to National Honour Act, 1971
• NSA, 1980
• Various Cr.PC amendments for having women centric laws.
• Environmental protection law, wildlife protection, air pollution, water pollution.

How to crack the world's toughest examination: Tedx talk by Dr.Roman Saini

TEDx talk by Dr. Roman Saini on How to Crack the World’s Toughest Examination 

So let me start off first with something on how to crack world’s toughest examination. What defines the toughness of an examination is the acceptance ratio i.e. the no. of candidates accepted divided by the no. of candidates applied. More than a million people give the IAS exam. If you have to become an IAS officer, the acceptance ratio for that is 1/10000 or 0.0001. So you have better odds of jumping from 50th floor and surviving rather than clearing the IAS exam. 

I am normal guy, an average student, exactly like you. No difference whatsoever. I had never been out of Jaipur till I was 16 yrs. of age. Never visited any state other than Rajasthan, studied from 4 different school due to different issues despite being living in the same place for 16 yrs. 

UPSC Preparation: What to do one month before prelims?

Dr. Roman Saini tells you the exact strategy to follow when the IAS prelims are just a month away

What to do one month before prelims
1 stop reading new  textbooks which you have never opened and stop buying new ones
2 all the notes made by you, consolidate it all at one place and of in electronic form take a print out and read them once daily till the examination starts.
3 give a test either going to a test series centre or online test series or Photocopy of the test at your own study place , at least 2-3 times a week.
4 while giving the test at your home either from photocopy or online, make sure you give it with full integrity that is no cheating around, no taking extra time and giving paper 1 and 2 on the same day.
5 if you are feelings anxious stressed etc take deep breaths, exercise, listen to music you like ,do yoga etc. for few hours and you will definitely feel the improvement.
6 start reading from already finished textbooks, at a very rapid pace which is called skimming and emphasise solely on keywords .
7 if there is an important table, figure , stats or any other high yield material either on Wikipedia, or laxmikanth or any environment topic or any private notes or otherwise, take a screen shot or a photo from your cell and print it out and consolidate all this material at one place.
8 stop group studying as now you have to read at your own comfort level and revise as much as possible. People in group are at different level of awareness about current events ,knowledge etc hence those who are less knowledgeable and learn at a somewhat slower pace, get a serious disadvantage.
9 don't study for 18 hours a day . Always maintain the average around 12 hours and have adequate time for relaxing your eyes, body and brain.
10 stop eating junk food, take liquid based diet, and semi solids and homemade balanced diet and never eat a lot at one go as it makes is lethargic and focus tend to digress.

UPSC Preparation: History optional tips by Ajay Kumar Bansal (AIR 178)

Strategy for History Optional

Name UPSC  - CSE 2013 Rank  Optional Subject Marks Scored Background

: : : : :

Ajay Kumar Bansal Rank 178 History 246(121+125) Civil Engineer IIT Roorkee

Hello Everyone ,

This is Ajay Kumar Bansal. I have secured rank 178 in this year’s UPSC Civil Service Examination. My optional was History, and it rewarded me handsomely in terms of marks.

History is a safe and scoring subject in this exam. While in recent years popular subjects like public administration, geography, sociology etc. have seen scores on a bit lower side, history has managed to maintain its old momentum.

Contrary to popular belief, history has a well defined and limited syllabus and even students from non- arts background can master it in short time. I am myself an engineer and still chose it. I have interest in history since school days, so this added up as a small bonus for me. Besides my own specialisation, Civil Engineer is unmanageable, because of vastness of syllabus, so I found history to be natural choice for me.

As per the new General Studies pattern, taking History also covers almost 60% of GS Paper 1. This year 15 out of 25 questions in GS Paper 1 were from history and Culture, so 150 marks of your GS are prepared automatically with this optional.

UPSC Preparation: Interview tips by Utkrisht Prasoon (AIR 101)

Utkrisht Prasoon (AIR 101), the highest scorer in the interview section of CSE-2013 gives some amazing tips on how to ace your interviews.

It is the last and final stage in the entire process. On the outset it might appear that 275 marks , which the interview carries is very little as compared to the totality of 2025 marks, especially as compared to the total 750 marks of the mains exam. It is indeed a supplement and not a decider to your final rank in the merit list. But it is also a game changer for your final rank as it is within your capacity to filter out more than 70 % of the 275 marks, as compared to the written marks, where even getting 40 % is a bit too difficult nowadays for most.

this is however, contingent on you being able to work the entire session work in to your favour. Remember, this isnt a test of your knowledge , but of your personality. hence it is how you present yourself that matters. you may be able to answer all the questions correctly, but if you somehow give an image of a person who is at the wrong place in the interview room, or someone whom the board members don’t want in the administration - you will be given less than average marks. It can also be the other way round that you might not be able to answer 99 out of 100 questions, but still you are able to get high marks, because of how you present yourself.

UPSC Preparation: Law optional tips by Sachin Sharma

1. I have done LL.B from Delhi University and it was my first year when I sincerely took up Civil Services Examination. Although Civils was my aim since my school days. I got the right platform for preparation when I entered Delhi University to pursue my LL.B. Fortunately the syllabus of LL.B of D.U was strikingly similar to that of the Law syllabus of the UPSC. I had the urge to study law from the beginning and when I started studying it, i found it very interesting and easy. Before opting law as an optional for CSE, i did a survey by asking friends and teachers regarding the scope of law as an optional. I met students who got through this exam with law as their option though they were not LL.B. This boosted my confidence and moreover i never found a student who has secured below average marks in Law. The syllabus of my college, my interest in law and the feedback which i got from the civils aspirant cemented my belief in Law and I took it.

2. Following are the subject wise books of law which aspirants should follow religiously:
a. Constitution – J N Pandey
b. Torts – R K Bangia/ Avtar Singh
c. Contract – Avtar Singh
d. Indian Penal Code – PSA Pillai’s Criminal Law
e. Public Int Law – Kapoor/ Gurdeep Bahari

3. Coaching plays an important role in preparation for CSE. But it is your own hard work which helps you reach the pinnacle of success. Coaching institutes will acquaint u with the syllabus. They can play an important role in deciding which topics could be left while preparing for the exam. They can provide you the notes on the aforementioned topics.

Motivation tips by Dr. Roman Saini

Firstly you have to understand one thing, Motivation is not magic. There is no shortcut to for motivation or to stay motivated and it is definitely not something that can be bought.

Every motivational author, speaker, life coach has their own set of tips and to-do's to achieve and sustain motivation. If you just google the word  motivation you'll be flooded with a gazillion links on how to stay motivated and all that BS and every article you read will have more or less the same points.

So what to do?

You can watch this Tedx talk which I gave on 24 August, 2014. Most of the feedback I have received tells me that it really helped people who have watched it and so I hope it might help you too at least in a teeny tiny manner.

I'll list down here six points that have been thoroughly researched and proven to help people in achieving their goal and help them in staying motivated: