Circular seating arrangement
Circular seating arrangement · people around a table
Story hook
It is Diwali night. Six cousins — Aarav, Bina, Chetan, Diya, Esha and Farhan — pull their chairs around the big round dining table. Grandma brings out a tray of laddoos and says, "Sit nicely, I want to take a photo!"
But the cousins are fussy. Aarav says, "I want to sit next to Diya." Bina says, "I will only sit directly opposite Chetan." Esha giggles, "And I want Farhan on my left side." Everyone starts shuffling chairs, bumping knees, laughing.
Grandma sighs. "Can someone just tell me one seating that makes everyone happy?"
This little puzzle — six people, one round table, a handful of "who sits next to whom" rules — is exactly the kind of question CSAT loves to ask. By the end of this lesson, you will be able to seat all six cousins correctly in under two minutes, with a clear picture drawn on your scratch sheet. Let us learn how.
Why this matters for UPSC
CSAT (UPSC Prelims Paper II) is a qualifying paper. That means you do not need a high score — you only need to cross 33%, which is 66 marks out of 200. You do not have to be a genius. You just have to collect the easy, sure-shot marks.
Circular seating arrangement is one of those sure-shot buckets. It needs no formula, no calculation, no English vocabulary. You just draw a circle, place dots for people, and follow the clues like a treasure hunt. A well-practised student gets these almost every time.
Every year, CSAT asks 1 to 3 seating-arrangement questions. Some are linear (people in a row), and some are circular (people around a table). The circular ones have one extra twist — left and right can flip depending on which way a person faces. Once you master that twist, these become free marks.
And the same skill quietly helps in real life — seating wedding guests, arranging a meeting, planning who sits where on a long car trip. Let us build it up from zero.
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