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Tuesday, December 11, 2012

History Optional in Civil Service Exam

IMO optionals in CSE are going to stay for atleast one more year (2013) before the Centre approves the new CSM pattern. So what I am going to write here wont be obsolete for atleast one more year.

History optional should be chosen only if one is deeply interested in it. It is a vast subject unlike public administration or sociology or literature or philosophy. Unless one is inquisitive about the subject it becomes tedious to read. People tend to choose optionals like PA or socio or literature etc, even if they dont have any positive interest in them, as they have less voluminous syllabus, as they are easy to score, as they are easy to understand, as study material and coaching are easily available etc. History differs from them on the first two points. So history is normally taken by people who do BA or MA in history or those who are really fascinated by the subject.

So, what to read for history optional from the exam point of view then?
Unfortunately there is no one book which is comprehensive enough, which has everything we need to study. There are many books to read and one has to take the help of internet too. But I will try to present the absolute minimum number of books you have to read which are indispensable. A beginner should first read +1, +2 NCERT books. After that proceed to read the following books.

1. Ignou BA (not MA material) for ancient, medieval, modern Indian history. Most important source of all. There are only very few topics in these booklets which you dont have to study. Otherwise you have to read most of them. It is lucidly written.
2. Gazetteer of India Volume-2 for ancient and medieval Indian history. You need to be discreet enough to leave some topics and subtopics through out the book particularly in political history part as these are not necessary for the exam but very interesting. This book is a good source for the art, architecture, S&T, social life, different sources of history. It is full of facts, there is a risk that some may lose interest in reading history. :-)
3. Medieval India by Satishchandra (both parts). Lucidly written book although biased.
4. Spectrum's A brief history of Modern India. This is a book which is normally studied for GS History. But this is enough for optional history too. It is well written abridged version of Grover and Bipanchandra put together.
5. Jain&Mathur for world history. I observed that some people have a low opinion about this book. But I found it be good from the exam point of view. Buy it.
6. Modern World History by Lowe. A very well written book.
7. Spectrum's Historical Atlas of India. This is not enough. You have to do much more than reading this one. I will write a separate post on how to prepare for map question which carries 60 marks.

Apart from the above books which are absolutely essential, take the help of internet particularly Wikipedia wherever necessary. There are certain other books which some people suggest but which are NOT necessary in my opinion. They are -

1. AL Basham's the wonder that was India - very nice book. Read it if you have spare time.
2. Romila Thapar's Ancient India - well written from Marxist perspective, biased. No need to read. One may hate Romila but none can disagree that she is good writer. :-)
3. DN Jha's book on ancient India - lucid but very biased. Useless to read.
4. Medieval India by JL Mehta (all 3 volumes) - good books but no need to read.
5. Bipan Chandra's two books : Struggle for Independence, India after Independence - very biased and useless books written by a Congress chamcha. Resist indoctrination. Dont forget to perform shuddhikaran on yourself to clean the polluted mind after reading these books. :-)
6. Modern Indian History by Sumit Sarkar -No need to read.
7. Grover's Modern India - Modern Indian history between 18th century and 1905 is given at length in this book. But history after that is rushed through. This is voluminous, full of details. Good book Buy this.
8. Modern Europe to 1870 by CJH Hayes - very nice book. Read it in spare time. If I am not wrong there is another book written by Hayes for history after 1870. I dont have that book.
9. Ensemble's History Atlas - no need.

There are many NBT books on History which makes your knowledge comprehensive like India by Al Biruni, Medieval India by Irfan Habib, Coins, Temples of South India, Temples of North India, a book on Aryans by Romila, Asokan inscriptions, Shivaji, Bhagat Singh, Partition, philosophy of bomb, Tagore and Nehru, etc etc. These books are of very low prices and if history intrigues you then read them in spare time (Not from the exam point of view but just for fun).

One may be wondering, "But what about the coaching material, like Baliyan?" I haven't even seen any coaching material for history but generally speaking coaching material is useless, shallow, unorganised, incomprehensive, written in poor language. So my suggestion would be not to buy any coaching material.

So these are the books to be read. But beginners may be wondering where to start. My suggestion would be to start with old NCERT books for +1, +2. Read them twice as if you are reading a good non-fiction non-acdemic book. Then proceed to read IGNOU material. After that you will figure a way by yourself.

And remember that studying history doesnt mean cramming all the facts. It is more about understanding the perspectives and ideologies, looking through the motives behind actions, understanding the causes behind the social, economic, political, cultural, religious, technological changes (change and continuity!). Dont blindly believe what the author is saying. Indian Marxist historians and Congress chamcha historians are good at twisting the facts into deceptively convincing and false narratives. Try to build your own arguments based on facts against what the author is saying.

Monday, December 10, 2012

Ignominy of Defeat

Before the beginning of the ongoing test series with England, our cricket superstars dubbed the series as the revenge series for the lashing we got in England last summer. And the Indian cricket fans like me believed them blindly, thinking that we are really going to avenge the drubbing. Alas, we became bakras again! :-(  The last thing we expected is to lose the series in a humiliating way which is what is going to happen most probably (still the 4th test remains).

Vainglorious English commentators, English cricket fans, haters of Indian cricket like Paki pigs are ripping apart Indian team on television and internet forums respectively for our loss and if our cricket stars are not thick-skinned, they would be feeling like being naked on a busy Indian street. But I guess our stars are used to getting this kind of torrent of criticism and they know the best way out - shrugging off just like pigs shaking off the mud. Next best way is to plan a series with Zimbabwe (not Bangladesh as it is a better team than India) in India and give a lifeline to the forlorn heavyweights in the team.

Much of the flak is directed against Sachin, Gambhir, Sehwag in the batting lineup which is as usual and Dhoni escaped with light criticism which is also as usual. Whatever is the criticism of Dhoni, it is not about his batting but about the captaincy and the possibility of losing it after the latest humiliating flagellation. If his test batting statistics are looked into then one conspicuous fact emerges. He stopped performing well from the middle of 2010. From then on, save 3 or 4 innings on the whipping boys of test cricket -West Indies and New Zealand, he is a failure. A few times he made half centuries on England etc after ugly slogging and when the defeat is a foregone conclusion.

In the press conference yesterday, Dhoni talked about the leadership quality of leading the side when in crisis and taking up responsibility and not thinking of running away. Rather deceptive words for the undiscerning. I dont know why this responsibilty didnt come to his mind when he came to bat in first innings of 3rd test only to play a careless shot of the first ball he faced almost into the hands of fatboy Samit Patel in midwicket. If only Samit was more athletic, Dhoni would have not made a fifty. His captaincy was something which I never liked. I always held that he was lucky to get a team with players at peaks of their careers. Now that the players are not at their best Dhoni is cut down to size. He doesnt deserve a place in the test team. A bowler like Ashwin is a better batsman with better technique than Dhoni. I just hope India loses the 4th test and he loses his place.

For someone who has seen Sachin playing in his glory days, the sight of Sachin looking bewildered at some ordinary ball from a commonplace bowler like Monty or Swann or some insignificant Kiwi bowler is a letdown. Sachin is almost 40 now, he played international cricket for almost 24 years and he has achieved whatever is achievable. His reflexes are not going to improve anymore and he is getting bowled most of the times. Except a few hardcore fanboys who are in denial mode, everyone wants him to vacate the place for an youngster but he is not listening. It no more amuses anyone when Sachin says he is enjoying playing cricket just as much as he did some 23 years ago. It actually leaves us sulking. He is gradually becoming a butt of jokes which is pitiful. I dont know what is stopping him but I guess it is the advertising contracts.

One important thing which begs for attention in Indian team is the famed spin bowling. After the retirement of Kumble our spin department continues to look precariously weak with inefficient spinners like Harbhajan, Ashwin, Amit Mishra, Piyush Chawla, Rahul Sharma. etc. Ojha is not as penetrating as Harbhajan once used to be, leave alone Kumble. Ashwin can only do well when the opposition is Windies or Kiwis on spinning tracks. Our batsmen too are very susceptible on not just fast spinning tracks like that of Mumbai but ordinary spinning tracks like that of Eden. Dhoni has become a butt of jokes after Mumbai debacle for his stubborn demand for rank turners which backfired badly. A classic case of hunter becoming the hunted.

With this series, the halo of invincibility at home that India has been wearing since long is shattered for good. I hope this loss sets in motion the requisite amends. Our imbecile selectors should show some spine in dropping the white elephants which are past expiry date.