Precis writing
Precis writing
10 min read · Updated 2026-05-25
What is a precis?
A precis is a compressed restatement of a passage in about one-third its length, written in your own words as continuous third-person prose under a three to six word title. In the Indian-language qualifying paper it carries 60 to 75 marks: a 540-word passage becomes a 180-word precis, with roughly 10 percent tolerance either way.
The story
It is August 2019. Mains hall, Bangalore centre. A Kannada-medium aspirant, score-strong in optional and GS-II, opens the Kannada Qualifying Paper. She handles comprehension well. Then the precis section: a 500-word passage about Karnataka's coastal ecology, with the instruction "summarise in approximately one-third the length in your own words, give a suitable title".
She panics. Counts every word as she writes. Re-counts. Strikes through. Rewrites. The clock eats 55 minutes. She submits a precis of 220 words — over the limit — with three quoted phrases lifted verbatim. Marks: 18/75.
Result: total qualifying paper = 70 / 300. Five marks short of 25%. Her entire Mains — including her 98-percentile optional — is disqualified.
This is precis. Brutal in penalty, simple in technique. A 500-word passage compressed into 170 words (one-third) sounds intimidating until you learn the 5-step compression method. After this unit, you will produce a 170-word precis in 25 minutes with consistent 55-65 marks out of 75 across all 22 Eighth-Schedule languages.
Why this matters for UPSC
Precis carries 60-75 of the 300 marks in the Indian Language Qualifying paper — the second-largest single block after comprehension. It has appeared in every Mains since 1979. The questions are deterministic (clear rules: one-third length, own words, title) so a disciplined candidate can score above 80%. Combined with comprehension, the two sections lock in 120-150 marks — twice what's needed to qualify. Skip practice here at your peril.