Revision summary
Emotional intelligence is trained use of feeling for a lawful public purpose. Goleman’s five workplace skills map onto hearings, riots, appraisals, and drives. Self-regulation stops a shout; empathy redesigns a cruel counter. Social skill briefings can cool a procession better than panic force. EI must not make prejudice efficient or grief a photo opportunity.
Model answer
Introduction
Emotional intelligence is trained skill in reading, using, and steering feeling so that a public purpose is served. In administration it is not softness; it is the difference between a hearing that cools a crowd and a noting that inflames it.
Body
The skill, named
- Mayer and Salovey: perceive, use, understand, and manage emotion in self and others.
- Goleman’s workplace set — self-awareness, self-regulation, motivation, empathy, social skill — maps onto the district day: the riot hour, the grievance hour, the appraisal hour.
- Aristotle’s mean already asked for anger that is right in amount and target; EI is that mean under a khaki or khaki-adjacent chair.
Applications in practice
- Self-awareness: I notice my caste irritation or tour fatigue before I write a refusal, so Article 14 does not leak into my mood.
- Self-regulation: I do not shout in a tehsil hearing or freeze in a flood; fear becomes a checklist, anger a lawful, measured order.
- Empathy: I redesign a disability certificate counter after watching a queue, which is Second ARC’s citizen-centric turn, not theatre.
- Social skill: I brief police and a peace committee in the same language of facts when a procession is due — rumour dies faster than a lathi.
- Motivation: I keep a sanitation or enrolment drive after the camera leaves; Goleman called this delayed gratification in office clothes.
- Appraisal and transfer talk: I separate the person’s fear from the file’s fault, so a junior can still tell me a bribe story.
Ethical limit
- EI must not weaponise a widow’s tears for a photo, nor make communal prejudice ‘efficient’. Feeling serves the Constitution, not the ego.
Flow diagram
flowchart TD A[Self-awareness] --> R[Self-regulation] R --> E[Empathy at the counter] E --> S[Social skill in the field] S --> P[Public purpose]
Conclusion
- Apply EI as a daily craft: notice feeling, steer it, use empathy to redesign the counter, and keep social skill for peace and truth. The test is a calmer, fairer file, not a warmer reputation.
Quick related
Students also ask
-
What do you understand by the term 'Public Servant'? What kind of aptitude is considered important for the civil services? Explain.
Next question in the 2020 paper (Q7). View answer →
-
Is EI the same as being emotional?
No. Being emotional is being flooded. EI is reading the flood and steering it.
-
Can EI justify bending a rule for a crying applicant?
Empathy sees the person; the rule still applies equally. Help through lawful windows, not through a secret exception.
PYQ trend
When UPSC asked this
Related PYQs from other years, newest first. Open a question to read it.
-
2023 · Q9 · UPGS4 · 8 marks
Explain the role of emotional intelligence for good governance and administration. -
2023 · Q11 · UPGS4 · 12 marks
What do you understand by Ethical Governance? Elucidate with example. -
2022 · Q4 · UPGS4 · 8 marks
What do you understand by emotional intelligence? Discuss its dimensions. -
2022 · Q17 · UPGS4 · 12 marks
Explain with suitable examples the ethical issues in corporate governance. -
2021 · Q8 · UPGS4 · 8 marks
‘Emotional Intelligence is very important in effective administrative practices.’ Throw light on this statement. -
2019 · Q18 · UPGS4 · 12 marks
Discuss the utility of Emotional Intelligence in administration. -
2018 · Q9 · UPGS4 · 8 marks
“Effective administration requires dedication towards Public Service.” Explain. -
2018 · Q17 · UPGS4 · 12 marks
“In essence emotional intelligence is not a theoretical concept but a multidimensional social skill.” Explain the concept and dimensions of emotional intelligence in the context of the statement.
More from this paper
Q1 · UPSC Mains 2020 · UPGS4 · 8 marks
Discuss the role of family, society and educational institutions in inculcating values.
Civil Service aptitude and values
Family plants trust, empathy, and honour through daily example, and can also plant prejudice. Society rewards or punishes those habits in the street, the market, and the media. School adds public reason so a value can be justified beyond the clan. Nai Talim, mid-day meals, and civic assemblies practise equality the lecture cannot. Office ethics overlay these maps; they do not replace them.
Q2 · UPSC Mains 2020 · UPGS4 · 8 marks
Discuss the role of the 'Right to Information' for transparency in governance.
Probity in Governance
RTI converts the citizen’s wish to see the file into a legal claim. Section 4 suo motu disclosure is the ethical heart; applications are the backstop. Second ARC treated RTI as a master key to good governance. Social audits of wages, rations, and contracts rest on that key. Exemptions must stay narrow, and the applicant must be safe, or transparency dies in practice.
Q3 · UPSC Mains 2020 · UPGS4 · 8 marks
"The requirement of government sanction for prosecuting dishonest officials is a protective shield for corruption." Examine the statement.
Probity in Governance
Prior sanction was meant to protect bona fide official acts from motivated FIRs. Section 197 CrPC and Section 19 of the PC Act are the usual locks. Endless delay, not the lock itself, is the shield for corruption. Second ARC and CVC lines wanted a clock and a reasoned order, including deemed sanction. Reform the timeline and the speaking order; do not abolish every filter.
Toppers' copies
Toppers' copies for this question will be uploaded soon.