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IGNOU student shares his CSE success strategy

KARTHIK Gurunathan Iyer, an M. A student of Indira Gandhi National Open University ( IGNOU), has secured all- India seventh rank in the Civil Services 2010 examination. This was the 21- year- old’s first attempt.

This graduate of Physics from Fergusson College, Pune, took the CDSC ( Combined Defence Services) exam twice after completing his class 12, and again after graduation in which he got the sixth and second rank respectively. But he was medically unfit was unable to get enrolled in the Air Force.

“That’s when I decided to take the UPSC exam. International politics has always attracted me and I was very sure I wanted to get into foreign services,” says Iyer. He did his schooling from Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan in Nagpur, the town to which he belongs, and completed plus two from SPI, Aurangabad.

While he finished his graduation from Pune, he also studied B. A. ( Political Science) from Annamalai University’s distance learning curriculum. It was when he enrolled in both the M. A. History programme at Pune University as well as M. A. Political Science at IGNOU that he decided to go for the big leap.

“ I started preparing for the exam after finishing my BSc and BA. I would sit for 10 hours which I increased to about 16 to 17 hours every day for almost two years. I did not even feel the need for coaching classes,” says Iyer.

While it took time and effort to complete reading his IGNOU and other M. A. books, he credits them for his sterling performance.