UPSC Results 2019: What was toppers’ success mantra? Stay away from social media

The UPSC Civil Services result 2018 was declared on April 5, 2019. Many of the toppers have revealed that staying away from social media is the best way not to get distracted. They even deactivated their handles on social media. “I considered it a waste of my time. I deactivated my Facebook and Twitter accounts. I am on Instagram but checked it only rarely, and then too, I only connected with a few people close to me,” the Indian Express quoted Kanishak Kataria as saying.

Kanishak Kataria and three others from Rajasthan are among the top 10 candidates clearing the civil services. "It was my first attempt and I was confident of getting a good rank, but number 1 rank was a big surprise for me. It is a childhood dream come true," he said.

"I never expected to get the first rank. I thank my parents, sister and my girlfriend for the help and moral support. People will expect me to be a good administrator and that's exactly my intention," he said.

Katarai's father Sanwarmal Verma is also an IAS officer. Kataria, a resident of the city, has earlier worked with a multinational company in South Korea and Bengaluru but resigned in 2017 to prepare for civil services.

He said he took coaching in Delhi and studied 8-10 hours daily and slogged 14-15 hours in the last two months before the examination.

Shreyans Kumat, fourth rank holder, Srushti Jayant Deshmukh from Bhopal, Varneet Negi from Bilaspur also did the same.

“I now have a smartphone and started using it,” said Rahul Sharanappa Sankanur from Hubli to the Indian Express.

However, Tanmay Vashistha Sharma, who ranked 10th, said he used some social media platforms. “Not Twitter, but I used Facebook to follow pages of newspapers like The Indian Express. And also, YouTube — the Rajya Sabha proceedings on YouTube is very good for preparation for the civil services exam,” he said.