Newspaper reading importance

Importance of reading newspaper:

Newspaper is a very important source in CSE preparation.  It’s an absolutely vital source of current affairs, and other details. Moreover, with a perceptible and decisive shift of UPSC prelims towards current affairs in UPSC prelims 2016, it has become more important than ever.

Which Newspaper to read?

Any good newspaper. By good newspaper we mean that any newspaper which does not publish rubbish content. By that yardstick only two newspapers qualify this test at this moment. The Hindu and Indian Express.

Where The Hindu excels:

The Hindu is a newspaper that subscribes to the “Centre of Left” Political philosophy. And because of this it’s general focus is more on issues of socio cultural relevance, and it reports on poverty, famines etc. very well. Moreover, The Hindu’s coverage of international issues is really good. Its Op Ed articles are also high quality.

Where the Hindu falters:

Sometimes due to its leftist political leanings, it resorts to unbridled criticism of the right wing (this present govt included). Moreover, being a centre of left newspaper it is a big votary of socialistic re distributive policies, even at the cost of economic growth and resulting into economic mismanagement.

Where Indian Express Excels:

Indian Express is more centrist in approach and that means no biased articles. That means a lot of room for manoeuvring towards either left or right. Also, IE has more balanced Op Ed articles. Moreover, its coverage of Economy is better than The Hindu.

Where it Falters:

Its coverage of international issue is not up to the level of The Hindu.

What about other Newspapers?

Times of India has generalist articles. But its language is better than both the above newspapers. But this exam does not test your language skills, rather it tests your knowledge, so in my opinion it’s not a good source.

How to read Newspapers?

When people start reading newspapers they tend to read serially from the first page to the last page. While the first page is important and needs to be read fully, pages from the second page onwards mostly contain local and masala news not relevant from UPSC point of view. So one has to skip these pages. After reaching the national section one has to read it . But only read important national news based on issues and not based on politics or news that is too much popular.

But for UPSC Civil Services the only important segments are Front Page, National News, Op-Ed page, International Page and Economy. Moreover, you need to read the newspaper from a critical eye. You must analyse an issue from multiple perspectives. Also, you need to read it with linking it to similar issues.