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Mains Prelims

Q2 · UPPSC PCS Mains 2023 · Essay · 50 marks · ~700 words in the hall · 2 min read

← Q1 Q3 →
English हिंदी

The problem of old people in metropolitan cities.

Topic: Literature, culture, society and polity. Syllabus: Section A — Literature and Culture; the Social sphere; the Political sphere. Same official PYQ from year-wise 2023 and Literature, culture, society and polity.

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Essay map

Opening scene

Anecdote

A flyover in Noida and an old man who cannot cross it in one green. Metros promised a son’s salary. They delivered a locked door and an app the parent cannot use. The problem is designed, not only ‘modern values’. Old age in a metro is a locked lift and a clinic too far. The problem is a city designed for a young wage, not a walkable hour.

Keep this in every paragraph

One stand

Loneliness, a health, a money, a abuse. UP migrants’ parents in a village is a cousin — but the stem is metro. Maintenance and Welfare of Parents Act as a peg.

Turn each heading into a full paragraph in the hall

Heading map

What the line is asking

  • Old people: a demographic. Metropolitan: a built form.
  • Problem: many — pick four.

Built / care

  • No footpath. A hospital that is a day-wage away in traffic.
  • A domestic worker who is the real geriatric system.

The counter

Romantic village that also abandons. And a private ‘senior living’ that is a class club.

Walkable hour

  • Loneliness, a pension, a tenant who is a son abroad.
  • Footpath, a bus step, a PHC that knows a chronic file.
  • Abuse in a flat; a day-care that is not a warehouse.
  • Metro pride that skips a grandparent is a thin civilisation.

Drop one peg where it fits — not a data dump

Value addition

  • Maintenance Act 2007 A legal peg.
  • NPOP / NPHCE Policy cousins — one line.
  • Art. 41 Public assistance in old age.
  • Census 60+ A number, no dump.
  • Footpath / bench Metro as a design of neglect.

Last 8–10 lines in the exam

Last paragraph

The problem of old people in metropolitan cities is a design, not only a tear. A locked lift, a clinic across a flyover, a pension that arrives as a rumour, a son on a video call — these are the city. Walkable hours, a public clinic that knows a chronic file, a law against abuse in a flat, a day-care that is not a warehouse: these are answers. Do not write a greeting-card of ‘our culture’. Close on a walkable hour and a public clinic. That is a metro that can still call itself a civilisation.

Quick related

Students also ask

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  • Full 700-word essay?

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

  • Tone?

    Urban care. One crossing. Not a gurukul sermon.

Same topic · past papers

UPPSC has asked this before

These previous-year questions sit on the same topic. Open one to practise the earlier ask.

  1. 2020 · Q2 · UPESS · 50 marks

    Caste System in 21st Century: Problem and Challenges.

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  2. 2018 · Q7 · UPESS · 50 marks

    The problem of Global Terrorism: causes and remedies.

    View answer →

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