Q3 · UPPSC PCS Mains 2020 · Essay · 50 marks · ~700 words in the hall · 2 min read

← Q2 Q4 →

Election Reforms in India: Necessity and Indispensability.

Topic: Literature, culture, society and polity. Syllabus: Section A — Literature and Culture; the Social sphere; the Political sphere. Same official PYQ from year-wise 2020 and Literature, culture, society and polity.

Essay map

Opening scene

Anecdote

A booth in a village still sees a queue that the world envies. Then a candidate with a pending charge and a cash haul in a car. Necessity of reform is that second picture. Indispensable: without it the first picture becomes a ritual. A queue that can be bought is not an election. Reform is necessity because the car around the vote became the story.

Keep this in every paragraph

One stand

  • ECI, a MCC, a RPA, a state funding debate, a criminalisation. 2020: cool, no party.

Turn each heading into a full paragraph in the hall

Heading map

What the line is asking

  • Necessity: problems that hurt legitimacy.
  • Indispensability: the system cannot coast.

Files

  • Money. Criminals. A paid lie. A delayed poll in a crisis year.

The counter

Simultaneous polls or a new ID as a silver bullet. Reform is a bundle; capture is the risk.

Queue and car

  • Money, a criminal candidate, a paid news — the car.
  • ECI, a ceiling, a voter ID, a simultaneous-poll debate — tools, not magic.
  • Inner-party, a paid volunteer, a booth that is not a fortress for one surname.
  • Keep the secret ballot sacred; clean what surrounds it.

Drop one peg where it fits — not a data dump

Value addition

  • Art. 324 / ECI The constitutional plumber.
  • RPA / MCC The legal and moral files.
  • Criminalisation SC/ECI data — peg once.
  • Art. 326 Adult suffrage — the miracle.
  • VVPAT / roll Trust as a machine.

Last 8–10 lines in the exam

Last paragraph

Election reform in India is necessary because the vote is still a hope and the car around it is often a market. Money, muscle, a criminal name, a paid feed — these make the queue a performance. Indispensability is not a new gadget; it is a ceiling that bites, a commission that is not a guest, a booth that a poor woman can reach without a surname test. Simultaneous polls are a debate, not a spell. Keep the secret ballot; clean the car. Close on a queue that remains sacred. That is reform as a republic’s hygiene.

Quick related

Students also ask

  • Water Pollution and Ganga Cleanliness.

    Next question in the 2020 paper (Q4). View answer →

  • Full 700-word essay?

    No. Map only. In the hall, grow each heading; write in English or Hindi, not both.

  • Tone?

    Institutional. One queue, one cash haul. Not a party pamphlet.

PYQ trend

When UPSC asked this

Related PYQs from other years, newest first. Open a question to read it.

  1. 2021 · Q1 · UPESS · 50 marks

    Art and social liberty.

    View answer →

  2. 2021 · Q2 · UPESS · 50 marks

    Secular Politics: Needs and Challenges.

    View answer →

  3. 2021 · Q3 · UPESS · 50 marks

    Status of Higher Education and Research in India: Ways of Future.

    View answer →

  4. 2020 · Q1 · UPESS · 50 marks

    Sociality of Literature.

    View answer →

  5. 2020 · Q2 · UPESS · 50 marks

    Caste System in 21st Century: Problem and Challenges.

    View answer →

  6. 2019 · Q1 · UPESS · 50 marks

    Literature and Moral Values.

    View answer →

  7. 2019 · Q2 · UPESS · 50 marks

    Sexual crime: cause and solution.

    View answer →

  8. 2019 · Q3 · UPESS · 50 marks

    One Nation, one Constitution.

    View answer →

More from this paper

Q1 · UPSC Mains 2020 · UPESS · 50 marks

Sociality of Literature.

Literature, culture, society and polity

Map. Lockdown reader. Stand: origin and effect are social; form stays. Peg Premchand. Counter: not a pamphlet.

Toppers' copies

Toppers' copies for this question will be uploaded soon.