CSAT Exam

Counted amongst the toughest exams in India, one needs to clear 3 levels namely Prelims, Mains, and Interview in order to join the coveted Civil Services. Paying more attention to other subjects, candidates often are unable to clear the prelims because of CSAT. Keeping in view its importance, here is a blog that will focus on the CSAT exam with all its components.

What is CSAT Exam?

CSAT, which is also known as the Civil Service Aptitude Test is one of the 2 papers of the Civil Services prelims examination. While General Studies Paper I consists of questions asked from dynamic and static GK and subjects like Indian National Movement, Polity, Environment, Geography, etc, General Studies Paper-II/CSAT assesses a candidate’s reasoning, English, and general aptitude.

CSAT Exam Highlights

Let’s understand the important parameters of the CSAT examination pattern through the table given below. 

Exam Name	Civil Services (IAS) Exam 2022
Conducting Body	Union Public Service Commission
Exam Level	National
UPSC vacancies	TBA
Exam Frequency	Once in a year
Exam Mode	Offline – Pen & Paper Mode
Exam Stage	Prelims – Mains (written) – Mains (interview)
Application Fee	100
Language	Prelims – English & Hindi
Number of Exam Centres	Multiple

Important Dates for 2022

Important Events	Date
Notification 2022 Release Date	02 February 2022
Application Date 2022	02 February 2022
Last date to apply	22 February 2022
Prelims Admit Card 2022 Date	10 May 2022
Prelims 2022 Date	05 June 2022
Prelims Result 2022 Date	22nd June 2022
Mains Exam Date 2022	16 September 2022
Mains Result 2022 Date	To be announced
Exam Interview Dates 2022	To be announced
Result 2022 (Final list of selected candidates)	To be announced

CSAT Exam Eligibility

The eligibility criteria of the CSAT exam is same as that of the IAS prelims. Candidates can click on the below mentioned button to know about the detailed IAS eligibility.

CSAT Exam Pattern 

Here is the detailed exam pattern of the CSAT prelims and Mains exam-

CSAT Prelims Exam:

Stated below are the important pointers related to the Prelims exam-

• MCQ Questions
• 0.66 marks will be deducted for wrong answers
• It is compulsory to appear in both the papers of the Prelims level
• Blind candidates will be given an extra time of ten minutes for each paper in the UPSC Prelims exam

Paper	Total Questions	Marks	Duration
Paper- I General Studies	100	200	2 hours
Paper-II GS (CSAT)	80	200	2 hours

CSAT Mains Exam:

Stated below are the important pointers related to the Mains exam-

• The candidates who secure marks above the cutoff marks in the UPSC Mains exam will be summoned for the Personality Test or the last stage of the CSAT exam.
• The candidates can select their medium of writing the UPSC Mains exam paper as Hindi or English or any other language as listed in the 8th Schedule of the Indian Constitution
• The Interview round/Personality Test will comprise of a total of 275 marks.
• The total marks of the UPSC Mains Paper are 2025 including the Personality Test.

Papers	Name	Marks	Duration
Paper A	Compulsory Indian Language	300	3 Hours
Paper B	English	300	3 Hours
Paper I	Essay	300	3 Hours
Paper II	General Studies- I	300	3 Hours
Paper III	General Studies- II	300	3 Hours
Paper IV	General Studies- III	300	3 Hours
Paper V	General Studies- IV	300	3 Hours
Paper VI	Optional Paper 1	300	3 Hours
Paper VII	Optional Paper 2	300	3 Hours

CSAT Exam Syllabus

Now that you have understood the pattern of the Civil Services Aptitude Test, let us go through the CSAT exam syllabus in detail.

• Comprehension
• Interpersonal skills including communication skills
• Logical reasoning and analytical ability
• Decision-making and problem solving
• General mental ability
• Basic numeracy (numbers and their relations, orders of magnitude, etc.) (Class Xth level)
• Data interpretation (charts, graphs, tables, data sufficiency, etc. – Class Xth level)
• Questions will be asked related to English Language Comprehension skills based on class 10th level.

CSAT Books

Bringing laurels in civil service examination is a quite challenging task, nevertheless, If you are abreast of the CSAT syllabus and are aware of your strengths and weaknesses, success will surely follow you. Tabulated below are some of the CSAT books that you can consider for practice:

Book Name	Author	Link
General Studies Paper 2 2020 for Civil Services Preliminary Examination	McGraw-Hill	BUY HERE!
Analytical Reasoning	M. K. Pandey	BUY HERE!
Cracking the CSAT Paper-2 – Civil Services Aptitude Test	Arihant	BUY HERE!
The Mantra of CSAT Paper II 2020	Gautam Puri	BUY HERE!
A Modern Approach to Verbal and Non-Verbal Reasoning	Dr R.S.Aggarwal	BUY HERE!
The Pearson CSAT Manual 2013	Edgar Thorpe	BUY HERE!
Quantitative Aptitude and Data Interpretation	Trisha	BUY HERE!
Conceptual Approach to Csat	P.N Roy Choudhary	BUY HERE!

Exam Tips 

Without any doubt, practice makes a man perfect. As discussed, CSAT examines a candidate’s logical and analytical reasoning along with English language skills. Thus, only with meticulous efforts and hard work, you can crack India’s toughest examination. Given below are some tips and tricks that you can consider for clearing CSAT.  

• CSAT is considered easy but it takes time to get a grasp over it. Analyse previous year question papers and identify your weak areas. 

• Since a lot of questions are asked from comprehension passages, it is essential that you devote some time to this. Go through the questions, read the passage and then start answering. This way you would know what you have to look for in the passage. Since passages require a lot of time to comprehend, practicing such CSAT questions is very crucial.

• To solve the reasoning part with accuracy, practice 5-6 reasoning questions every day. Go through the previous year question papers to understand the difficulty of such questions and start practicing accordingly. 

• Keep important mensuration formulas or those related to topics from the analytical section in front of you. Memorise them thoroughly. 

• Enroll yourself in online mock exam series to check your clarity and ability pertaining to the examination. 

• Be a voracious reader of newspapers, magazines, and journals as it can help you comprehend the passages better, improve your vocabulary and grammatical skills. 

CSAT Trend Analysis 2011-2020

Year\Topics	Math & Basic numeracy	Logical & Analytical reasoning	Reading comprehension	Decision making	Data Interpretation
2011	11	17	39	8	5
2012	3	28	40	9	0
2013	11	21	33	6	9
2014	20	23	31	0	6
2015	30	18	30	0	2
2016	31	21	28	0	0
2017	28	22	30	0	0
2018	18	22	26	0	14
2019	32	18	30	0	0
2020	42	12	26	0	0

FAQs

Undoubtedly, the field of Civil Services is meant to bring transparency and accountability in the administrative services undertaken by the Government of India. Are you feeling alienated from your career goals? Apprehensive about choosing the right career? Sign up for an E-meeting with the experts at Leverage Edu who not only will guide you in choosing a stream that aligns with your skills but will also help in completing admission related formalities!