36th BCS Prelims...

(I wrote this piece on 10/01/2016, after the 36th BCS preliminary examination had concluded.)

For those who appeared in the 36th BCS preliminary exam only—

Since the results of the 30th BCS came out before the 31st BCS viva, I didn’t go to take the 31st BCS viva exam. Naturally, after the 31st BCS preliminary in May 2011, I didn’t have to study for BCS preliminaries anymore. (And I didn’t. Job examination studies aren’t the kind you do out of love. Everyone does it merely to score marks and get a job. Though there are some people who lovingly post questions like “What is the name of Bangladesh’s national poet?” on various Facebook group walls, asking everyone to help them “get confirmation,” and then score poorly and fail.)

The BCS examination syllabus is such a zoo-like syllabus that loses its effectiveness both through practice and lack of practice. My knowledge has deteriorated, and the fault isn’t mine alone—it’s the system’s too!

This 36th BCS examination question was entirely traditional in nature. Regardless of how basic one’s foundation might be, the more questions candidates had practiced, the harder it would be for them to fail this exam. The 35th BCS examination, in my view, had the most difficult preliminary and written question papers in BCS history. I myself am as doubtful as many others about how well I would have performed in that BCS.

Let me share a secret. Most likely, if we made a list of candidates across Bangladesh who solved the highest number of questions for the 30th and 31st BCS preliminaries, my name would be among the top 5. Why am I saying this? This means I believe that to pass the BCS preliminary, reading one set of guides/digests/question banks is wiser than reading 10 reference books. The BCS examination isn’t a test of being knowledgeable—it’s a test of scoring marks.

I should mention something. I was an extremely weak candidate in general knowledge. You can’t imagine how weak such a candidate could be! How I managed to bring it up to a workable level—I’ve written about that in another note, so I won’t repeat it here. I was much better than necessary in the other four subjects. I always tried to understand where the problem lay in how others studied. The advantage of taking the path that reduces study load is this: (even if you don’t do more) you’ll put in the same effort as others, but while others spend time reading something unnecessary or less necessary, you can give two revisions to something necessary, or study one necessary thing you’ve read before and one necessary thing you haven’t read yet. Calculate it—your useful/necessary reading is at least double compared to others!

From May 2011 until today, I haven’t had to do anything related to BCS preliminaries. Naturally, during this long period, my memory of preliminary studies has faded. Last Friday, there was a career session at RUET. After speaking at RUET’s auditorium all day, I returned to Dhaka on the night train. Yesterday I was running around all day for some work matters. After traveling all night again, I reached Satkhira in the morning and entered the office by 9 AM. This evening, having some free time and to fulfill requests for a post about what the “cut marks” might be for the 36th preliminary, I downloaded a question paper and sat down to take the exam. Since I wasn’t filling in circles or completing other formalities, and didn’t have to deal with the “mysterious tension” of the exam hall, I took the exam looking at the wall clock, keeping my wristwatch and calculator in the drawer, intending to solve the entire question paper within 50 minutes. I answered 154 questions confidently. Then I checked them by browsing the internet and various online forums, and found I had made 5 mistakes. So I scored 146.5. Assuming that in a real exam, with confusion but the reluctance to leave questions unanswered till the end, I would have marked about 10 more. Of those, 7 would be wrong, meaning I’d mark 164 and get 12 wrong, scoring 146. If I divide the total 200 marks like this: Bangla (35) + English (35) + Mathematics & Mental Ability (30) + General Science & Technology (30) + General Knowledge (55) + Others (15), then perhaps my marks would come like this: Bangla (28) + English (32) + Mathematics & Mental Ability (29) + General Science & Technology (24) + General Knowledge (22) + Others (11). The entire credit for this goes to the easy questions of the 36th BCS preliminary. If it had been the 35th BCS, things might have been different.

Here are some of my personal observations about the questions:

One. The question paper was definitely very conventional. No need to be brilliant to pass this exam. Having well-studied guide books/job solutions/question banks/digests/model test guides would be sufficient.

Two. There were fewer confusing/incorrect questions in this exam.

Three. The International Affairs section seemed a bit difficult.

Four. Let me discuss some questions:

1. Current membership of NAM— This question has no answer.

2. The prerequisite of good governance is— This question is confusing.

3. Which is correct about LinkedIn? Looking at the four options of this question, it seems PSC gave this question so everyone could get 1 mark easily!

4. If (25)^(2x+3) = 5^(3x+6), then x = ? Substituting the value of x from the four options into the given equation would take one-fifth the time of the conventional method. The same applies to: One solution of x^2+y^2 = 185, x-y = 3 is— and What percentage of 2 is 8? … This too!

5. Square root of 15.6025 = ? This question was given just so some people would waste time trying to solve it foolishly. What’s the point? The easiest question in the 36th BCS exam was: What is the current government of Bangladesh’s major achievement? That also carried 1 mark! Yet without knowing the easy technique, finding that square root to get the same 1 mark would take at least 20 times longer! But difficult questions carry the same 1 mark!

6. At how many points do two parallel lines intersect? This question has no answer. Which is the correct spelling? Same issue!

7. Credit Tk 5000 _ my account. Those who check mobile banking messages shouldn’t take even 1 second to answer this.

8. Verb of ‘Number’ is— This question has two answers; both ‘number’ and ‘enumerate’ work. So this question is also confusing.

9. ‘Gitanjali’ of Rabindranath Tagore was translated by— This question also has no proper answer, but PSC accepts W.B. Yeats as the answer. Well, who said they must? They might not! Yeats didn’t even know Bengali! So how could he translate Gitanjali? … No point in lengthy discussion. In short, this is also a confusing question.

The wise thing is this: there’s no need to answer confusing questions! Talking about wrong questions? Well, whether you answer wrong questions or not makes no difference. They give everyone average marks for those.

Five. With the difficult questions of the 35th BCS exam, PSC hinted to 36th BCS candidates: “Study tremendously to strengthen your basics, or you’ll fail the preliminary! Just reading market books won’t help much.” With the easy questions of the 36th BCS exam, PSC has hinted to 37th BCS candidates: “Study tremendously to strengthen your basics, or if the 35th BCS exam ‘returns’ after a ‘gap,’ you’ll fail the preliminary! But not reading market books won’t help much either.”

From the day before yesterday until writing this note, I’ve received at least 1500+ inbox messages and phone calls asking “What might be the cut marks for the 36th BCS exam?” Among those who contacted me were candidates who graduated from ‘good, average, poor’—all three types of educational institutions. After silently studying related materials in various Facebook groups, some things have come to my mind.

One. Easy questions, so here even 0.5 marks means a lot!

Two. Questions are easy, so let’s quickly mark everything in joy!—In this joy and nervous pressure, many have marked wrong answers to many questions. (I would have done the same if I had taken the exam.)

Three. If PSC allows 10 thousand candidates to take the written exam, the cut marks will be 105-109.

If PSC allows 12-15 thousand candidates to take the written exam, the cut marks will be 99-102.

If PSC allows 20-22 thousand candidates to take the written exam, the cut marks will be 91-98.

Now let me say a few things to conclude this writing.

One. None of us know how many PSC will allow to take the written exam this time. However, my personal guess is that this time’s cut marks will be between 93-100.

Two. You’re not the only one who marked known things wrong—the person who will top the 36th BCS combined merit list has also marked them wrong. So there’s nothing to be so upset about.

Three. Most of those claiming huge marks and calling themselves great scholars will fail hugely and provide us all with great entertainment. Let the results come out and see what happens! Just wait & see!!

Four. You won’t get much time to prepare for the written exam after the preliminary results come out. The BCS exam is mainly about doing well in the written exam. I can challenge and say that if someone properly studies hard for the written exam, they have a 95% chance of being in the top 10 of the merit list. The remaining 5% depends on luck. Don’t believe in luck? Fine, at least try taking the BCS exam once with proper preparation!

I’ll write later about how to start studying for the written exam. (Those interested can check my Facebook notes on written preparation strategies. I have at least 15+ Facebook notes about the written exam.) That’s all for now! May God bless you all.

Best wishes

Sushanto Pal

One of your senior colleagues