General Awareness and Current Affairs
What this domain tests
General Awareness and Current Affairs is the highest-yield section per minute of study. The paper draws on the Indian economy and banking, insurance and social-security schemes, appointments, awards, sports, summits and indices, static GK (Constitution, geography, national parks, books), and the current affairs of roughly the preceding six to eight months - with a visible bias toward labour, employment and social-security news.
What to hold in memory
- Scheme numbers: PMJJBY offers ₹2 lakh life cover at ₹436 a year; PMSBY offers ₹2 lakh accidental cover at ₹20 a year; both sit under the Jan Suraksha umbrella and need a bank account.
- Institutions: EPFO (UAN, provident fund, pension), ESIC (medical and cash benefits), NPS (2004 for government employees, 2009 for all), Atal Pension Yojana (2015; entry age 18–40; pension ₹1,000–5,000 after 60).
- Constitutional anchors: social security sits in the Directive Principles (Articles 41–43); labour is a Concurrent List subject.
- Current affairs: RBI policy rates, social-sector budget allocations, new Labour Code rules, employment and unemployment survey releases.
Worked example
'How much does a subscriber pay annually for the ₹2 lakh accidental death and disability cover under PMSBY?' Reasoning: PMSBY is the accident scheme; PMJJBY is the life scheme - swapping them is the classic error. PMSBY's premium, revised from ₹12 to ₹20 per year from June 2022, gives ₹2 lakh for accidental death or total disability and ₹1 lakh for partial disability. Answer: ₹20.
Traps
Swapping PMSBY and PMJJBY; answering with an older 'first' fact when the question asks for the current one; ignoring negatives such as 'which is NOT'; and skipping static GK because current affairs feels urgent, when roughly a third of the section is static.