Overview of the Anthropology collection
Anthropology is one of the best known optional subjects in the Civil Services Mains, and this resource brings its question papers together. The series is made of twenty-four papers: Paper I and Paper II for each year from 2016 to 2025, the two papers of 2013, plus Paper I and Paper II of 2014. Each paper carries English and Hindi wording on one sheet, exactly as the Commission printed it.
Four archived PDFs are attached to this page. They begin with Paper I of 2014 and then move to Paper I and Paper II of 2025 and Paper I of 2024. Some scans are light, around a tenth of a megabyte, while the 2025 scans are bigger at roughly one and a half megabytes each. No solutions are embedded.
Coverage by year
- 2025 and 2024: both papers for each year.
- 2023, 2022, 2021, 2020 and 2019: both papers for each year.
- 2018, 2017 and 2016: both papers for each year.
- 2014: Paper I and Paper II.
- 2013: Paper I and Paper II.
The gap years between 2014 and 2016 are not in this series.
Reading the papers the right way
Paper I is traditionally weighted towards the foundations of the subject, such as human evolution, biological anthropology, archaeology and social theory. Paper II turns to Indian anthropology, tribal society, policy and development. Reading both across a dozen years shows how the examiner moves between theory and Indian case material, and which thinkers or concepts come back often.
A suggested routine
- Start with the oldest paper and write every answer in the allotted word limit, without notes.
- Mark where you ran short of examples, then fill those gaps from your notes.
- Move to the recent papers and watch how the question wording has shifted towards application.
- Keep a one page list of anthropologists and cases that you can quote quickly.
Who benefits
Anyone who has taken or is considering Anthropology as an optional will find this useful, especially repeaters who want a fresh pass through every paper in order.
Because the Hindi and English wording sit together, bilingual readers can also pick up the standard Hindi terms for concepts such as kinship, descent or archaeological periods.
Print options
Competer also sells printed UPSC previous year material and optional notes if you want a hard copy to annotate.
