How to crack Judicial Services exam

Come out of your phobias

The course is bulky for everyone and everyone has only 24 hours to study. Vacancies are also same for
everyone and you just need only one seat for yourself.
Quite often than not, aspirants are confused whether to take coaching for the judicial services exams or not.
Coachings are not helpful unless there are good teachers out there with innovative teaching methodology. If
you find a coaching centre with this qualities, then go ahead for it. Else, self-study is sufficient.
Believe me, there is really no need for coaching at all. You just need to make a special plan for yourself and
stick to it.

Study Smart and not Hard

You must scrutinize your syllabus smartly and target only the scoring areas. There are some areas of the
syllabus which can cost you time equivalent to the time of 4-5 other subjects and have weightage of just 1 or
2 marks while there are subjects which you can complete in a flash of time and they have weightage of a lot
of marks. Just identify these subjects and concentrate on them. Remember even the toppers get only 55 -60
% marks and cut off is much lesser, you don’t have to get full marks to clear it, you just need to score the
cutoff marks to crack it.

Prepare important topics in this manner

After you identify important topics, your next target is to prepare for them in a proper way. First, make a
proper schedule.
There are few thumb rules which we must keep in our mind.
1. Try to learn something new and add to your notes etc. every day.
2. Learn whatever you have written today – Know the art of note making. Learn today’s work you have
done, today only. If you will leave it for tomorrow you will forget most of it and also probabilities are that
you will never end up completing it.
3. Revise old work daily. Even if you have to skip step one and two then also revise at any cost.
Rajasthan Judicial Services is a never-ending process. So you need to update yourself day by day. But key to
success is revisions. Completing the syllabus is not an as difficult task as it is to keep it in your mind. There
are people who understand and learn things very well but the main issue with them is that they forget
everything by the time. There is no other option to do it except by revising it on a daily basis. At the start,
you may find it boring and time-consuming, but when the day for your test will come, your confidence and
performance will be much higher than others.

Prepare bare acts well

Many questions are based solely on bare acts, especially in pre-examinations. Moreover, in long answers
type questions, bare acts will equip you with a lot of material to properly understand the question and then
explain and write it. Sometimes there will be a question which will be so unexpected that you will not have
enough of matter to write on them.
Good knowledge of bare acts gives you an edge over others. You can at least write something on it if you
have basic knowledge of that question. It’s better to write something instead of leaving a question
unattempted, but if you will just write anything you are not going to get marks for it.

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Past year papers are a must
Just find out past year papers from market or net and prepare answers to them. Just check them yourself for
the first time. You will yourself identify many of your mistakes. Then after preparing a final answer to them,
give them to some lecturer or experienced person to check. This will help you a lot to improve.

Take help of books and bare acts also, when the first time you try to solve these paper
Yes, you have heard it correctly. First time when you give yourself a test for solving past year papers just
cheat. This cheating is good for your later performance. But don’t make it your habit. This applies just for
the first time you attempt it. This is because you will be able to write the best answer in this way. After you
prepare a final answer to them it will not at all be needed. Also, this will help you to identify ‘ how to write a
proper answer and how to deal with a particular question’. Once you know how to do it, then there is no
need to continue this procedure.

Keep a track of time while solving past year papers

There is no benefit of having a very good knowledge or writing a very good answer to few questions of the
exam when you can’t complete your paper in given time. Most of the deserving candidates fail to clear it just
because they couldn’t complete paper on time.
A person getting 6 out of 10 in all 10 questions on an average is much better than a person getting 8 out of
10 in 7 questions and leaving remaining three empty. Just practice again and again and again and practice
until you can complete your paper with at least half an hour additional in your hand after completing it. If
you can complete it in this much time at your home then only you will be able to complete it in given time at
the examination centre. Your speed of doing MCQs must be at least 120 questions per hour.

Good handwriting
Believe it or not, but they check your copies in a hurry. If they find your writing good you get better marks
for their convenience, while if you have bad writing, no matter how excellent content you write, fetching
marks will be difficult.
Give equal weightage to minors, locals, majors, language, judgement writing etc.
If you think that you can leave something for now and will do it later, believe me, you will not get time for
that later also. Once you are done with your syllabus then during revision your speed of revisions must reach
up to a level that you can revise at least 4 average sized minors including local acts ( number may increase
or decrease as per the length and weightage of minors), ¼ the of a major, one essay either in Hindi or
English per day, and a portion of judgment writing daily.

Study in groups
Most interesting way to learn is to study in groups. You can internally compete in many ways and the loser
gives the party. Ways can be – (a) who can reproduce maximum sections at a given time with most
perfection (b) or you can divide sections eg. 100 sections of IPC each among yourselves and reproduce them
in the group – in this way, all of you will revise whole IPC on the go and so on.

Start teaching
Best way ever to learn something is to teach someone. This can increase your knowledge to the extent you
can’t even imagine. This compels you to study as you have to face students and also you will find new
questions each day asked by students which you couldn’t have come through by yourself.

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Prepare colourful notes
If you have a habit of making notes then make them with colourful pens etc. Like heading with different
colours, subheadings with different, case laws with different, important principals with different, section
numbers with different and so on. This may seem to be time-consuming to you or a difficult task for now,
but it makes learning a lot easier. Our brain has a habit to remember colourful notes much easier than one
coloured notes. When the time will come you will remember even the page and the portion of the page
where you had written a particular case law just because your brain has taken a picture of it due to that
particular colour. Moreover, it helps out in quickly going through your notes. Suppose you want to search a
particular case law for a particular section and your eyes will search only for a particular colour instead of
whole notes how much time it will save at the time of last revisions when every second is important.

Make fair notes in the first instance only

If you are going to coaching, then anyhow make fair notes in the first instance only. Don’t try to take rough
notes at classes and then fair them out. They will cost you unnecessary time and they not at all amount to
revising the notes as all your attention is just on making your notes look beautiful and not on revising,
Instead make fair notes at the same time and then make rough notes to shorten them up and then to further
shorten them and then to shorten them to such extent that you can have all your notes in your own code
language understandable by you in as less as one notebook. Yes, whole bulk of 50 subjects only in a single
100-page notebook.

Language paper can be divided into two parts

For pre, you have to prepare grammar. No need for any fancy book or coaching at all for this. Just buy any
good grammar books of 10th and 12th standard with solved exercises. Just practice these solved exercises
and compare your answer with it. If you do it properly you will not need anything else for it.
For mains just divide essays into various categories such as- Rajasthan, Legal topics, Current issues etc.
Then prepare a list of topics on all these categories which are most probable to come. Prepare points in any
language ( English or Hindi) on these topics. Just take a topic each day and try to write an essay on it
including the points jotted down by you. Check it yourself and then write an improved version of it and then
get it checked by someone experienced. Your work is done now you are ready for the language paper. Don’t
ever try to cram up an essay as they always give the same topic but with some twists. So if you will write
that crammed up essay you will not get good marks. Just remember the important points of the essay which
is a lot easier to remember than a whole essay and try to learn the art of writing an essay. In this way, no
matter which essay they will give you to write, you will end up writing a good essay for sure.

Relax
When you have prepared as explained above, just relax at the time of exams. Eat light food. Enjoy for few
moments.
Manage yourself and prepare in a way that you can revise full syllabus within 3-5 days
When others will be running here and there, you know that you don’t have to, coz you have done everything
and you are well managed. If you have done everything as explained above you will be having very short
notes which could be revised in very less duration but with much better content than others. You will never
be confused. You will have a speed of revising whole Rajasthan Judicial Services Examination syllabus
within 7 days. While others would be doing at max 1 or 2 revisions, you would be doing at least 5-6
revisions.

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Judgement Writing
 You will not get any book in the market on judgement writing specially targeted to judicial exam
approach. Also on the net, you will hardly find any good judgements (especially in English). The judgments
available on the net are all judgments given by high courts, supreme court and higher courts and hence, they
are of no use to you.
 So what you need to do is, just go to local courts, enquire about some judges who are respected for
giving good quality judgements, then you can apply for certified copies of their judgments. Just prepare a
list of different kinds of judgements like civil, criminal etc. and apply for them. They will provide you
copies, but they will be in Hindi most probably or may even be in some local languages.
 Just read them 4-5 times at least. Mark important portions and common portions of each judgement.
This will give you a broad overview and a skeleton of a judgement. You will also get to know important
ingredients of any particular type of judgement.
 Now just translate this judgement in English (Hindi medium students don’t have to do it). Now take
few past year papers and try to attempt judgement writing questions from them. Try to get them checked by
someone experienced and practice more and more judgements. Except these, there are various books
available for skeleton of various applications, bails, FIRs, charges, etc. You can easily learn them from there.
 Remember, in actual situations judgements are given on much-complicated situations then the
situations given in exam questions. Thus, they are much larger in size and much complicated. They are not
expected from you that level of understanding of the situation and to write that level of judgement. You
don’t have to show your knowledge of language or complications in them. You just have to show that you
have basic knowledge of skeleton of judgement and also you have a basic level of understanding of
situations given to you. You will not get enough time to write a high-quality judgement. You will have to
attempt it in a time limit and restrict your word limit to make that possible.
 Every step of judgement including its skeleton have marks allotted to them. If you can’t write a good
appreciation of issues or a good decision, don’t worry, they are just a part of a whole judgement, and if you
write other things properly and your skeleton is correct you will definitely get some marks for that.
 Read question properly and mark important points in question itself. Plaint and written statement are
a mere repetition of the facts given in question in a proper skeleton and few other things like court fees etc.
which you can do very easily.
 The framing of issues is also not a difficult task. If you read the question properly, you can easily
identify points of difference among parties. You just have to frame an issue on each of such point of
difference in proper legal language.
 Appreciation of evidence is again mostly repetition of facts given in question itself in a proper formal
way. And in all these fields you can score very well.
 Only the final verdict portion is a technical thing which you will need a lot of practice to master. But
if you can’t, then it will not make much difference as this portion has only some marks allotted to it, other
portions will earn you some good marks.
 Similarly in criminal judgement questions also FIRs, charge framing etc, are only repetition of facts
of the question in a proper skeleton. Only verdict portion is critical, otherwise, all other things are just to be
placed in a proper skeleton.
 No matter, how better judgement you write, don’t expect very good marks in this question. Copies
are checked by very senior judges, and they can find mistakes in any given judgements of even sitting
magistrates who are trained especially in judicial academy after selection on writing judgements, you can’t
match their expectations so don’t waste much time to please them, this is not a question where you can score
well.
The interview is a test of your confidence and spontaneousness and not of your legal knowledge

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Yes, you have heard it correct. Although this may need a whole article separately, I will give you an idea of
how to do it. They are not checking your legal knowledge in your interviews. Most of the questions they ask
in Rajasthan Judicial Services interview are based on practical situations rather than on legal knowledge.
The question will be general even when they are based on legal situations eg. girls may be asked what
opinion do you have on the misuse of domestic violence act and 498A, similarly others may be asked what
do you think about reservations, and so on. You are expected to give some practical and innovative answer
to them and not purely your knowledge of acts and constitution. You will hardly get 2-3 minutes to answer a
question generally ( rarely more than that depending on their mood). You have to utilize these 2-3 minutes to
show them that how out of the box is your mental approach and not your legal knowledge.
They already know that you have cleared mains that in itself means that you have legal knowledge, and they
never distrust their own selection and scrutinizing skills. They will try to irritate you also and at the same
time, they will fire legal questions on you. At that point of time, you will start believing that you don’t know
anything and you will start losing your confidence. Those questions are also never meant to judge your legal
knowledge. They are meant to do just they are doing with you i.e to shake you mentally. And now they will
fire a question as easy as even a first-year candidate can answer and you will be so irritated mentally that
you can’t answer it also. Their work is done, they have found that you can’t handle pressure and hence, they
will reject you. Then how to tackle this situation? Just stay calm. Now as you know that they are not
expecting any answer from you for those question, simply keep saying sorry sir, I don’t know the answer to
this question. Let the final easy question come and answer it and be happy, you will surely get good marks in
an interview as they have now found that you can very well handle pressure.
Few final tips

Stay away from negative people and negative thoughts

Just cut off in examination days from people who give negative thoughts to you or speak negatively. Also,
stay away from candidates who show off too much or ask silly and complicated questions which never
comes in the exams but only demotivate you. They do this intentionally to demotivate you by asking you
these questions. Just prepare colourful and easy to remember notes, and prepare the short notes which are
easy to carry and handle for last time revisions, don’t go for unnecessary coachings unless they are
specifically targeted for Rajasthan Judicial Services Examination with special emphasis on how to deal
current pattern of practical questions, It’s not more than 6 months of hard work and rest what you get is a
bonus before vacancies. If you work accordingly for 6 months then you just have to sit, practice and revise
no need of doing anything else. Stay disconnected with negative people and negative thoughts, revisions are
the key to success, sleep well, attempt as many past year papers as you can, remember be prepared well in
advance and at the last time just revise your short notes, important points and solve past year papers. No
need to take on the pressure upon yourself. Just keep some time to enjoy and refresh your mind as a fresh
mind works much faster than an overburdened one.
As I already mentioned, there are no shortcuts to success and hard work cannot be replaced by shortcuts, but
yes there is a difference between hard work and smart work. These tricks played an important role in my
success in various exams as well as the success of many of my students. They converted their hard work into
a smart work. Remember it’s an elimination test and not a selection test. Keeping nerves at the last moment
is the key to success which can be achieved only if you are well organized well in advance. Maybe these
tricks will not give you shortcuts, but yes, if adopted will lessen your burden a lot, especially during your
last revisions. These are not all-inclusive tips and everyone can adopt his own tricks to do this. The only
thing to keep in mind is to manage yourself such that you can revise everything in a very short span of time
of 3-5 days without any tensions. Hope all the readers will gain something and will come in their future
exams with flying colours.

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Don’t prepare for pre separately
Pre is just a qualifying exam for mains. Its marks will never be added to your final score. Every person
above cut off have equal opportunity. Just prepare for mains and keep practising MCQs from the universal
guide or any other good guide for 2 hours daily. Your law is already being prepared side by side. You just
need to practice and that will be done in those 2 hours. Those 2 hours are more than sufficient for MCQs
part. You will not get time to prepare for your mains after pre. This is a very big mistake most of the students
do. You will always find people saying that once let me concentrate on pre, if I’ll clear it then I’ll look for
mains. They are those who have already lost the battle. They are targeting just for pre and not for finally
clearing the exams. Your pre will be prepared along with your mains itself. In addition to that, you just need
to practice MCQs.

Difficulties and Phobias which we face as a candidate

There is no shortcut to success. No one has ever achieved anything without hard work through shortcuts.
 Bulky Syllabus: We have to cover almost 50 legal subjects to crack it.
 Less number of vacancies which are decreasing day by day.
 Boring coaching classes with old-fashioned method of teaching: Syllabus has changed a lot and most
of them have not adapted to it.
 Most of the good coaching classes are targeted to other judiciaries: They follow their own schedule,
answer writing pattern is different from RJS.
 No one is there to teach you local acts and acts specifically for Rajasthan.
 Lack of practical knowledge (court practice experience) among teachers and many RJS questions are
based on practical experience these days.
 Lack of good reference books especially for English medium candidates of RJS.
 Experienced teachers have taken retirement and are not teaching now.
 There is neither proper guidance nor any reference book for judgement writing question which are
equal to 15-20 % of total marks.
 Till you will complete your last subject you would have probably forgotten your first one and this
cycle continues.
 Two whole papers on Essay writing with 3 essays each: As you don’t have enough material you will
either have to waste your time on the net for searching or you will not get good marks. There is no one to
guide you on “how to write a legal essay”.
 Taunts of relatives: There is not a single candidate of RJS who has not faced it. Our relatives only
add on to our situations by asking questions like: What are you doing these days? And when we say that
preparing for RJS, they laugh and say “ Ah! He is doing nothing but sitting at home”. When they ask
Haven’t you appeared for the exam yet? And we say vacancy has not been declared yet, and they say that “
haha! He must have failed “. And most interesting one is that they are more excited about our results then we
are “ haven’t they declared your result yet?”. There is a never-ending list of these taunts.

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