[UPSC Interview 2021] – Transcript #33 : Smita Nagraj Board, Mathematics Optional, Chess, Movies Hobbies

Date of interview:  08.04.2022, Afternoon
Board: Smita Nagraj
Optional: Mathematics
Background:  IIT Kharagpur
Employee: (if any)- workex as Model Risk Analyst at an investment bank
Hobbies: Chess, watching socially relevant movies

Your experience in interview- very cordial board, some interesting questions, some easy questions, very thoughtful IR questions.

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Chairperson

1. You have worked at Model Risk Analyst, how will that knowledge be useful for public administration?
2. Suppose I ask you to build a model to predict Russia Ukraine war. What will be the outcome of your model? (2-3 follow ups on this)
3. Do you know about game theory?
4. How can game theory be applied to look at Russia Ukraine crisis?
5. Why there is so much negative publicity for Russia right now but when western nations were involved in human rights violations in West Asia, there wasn’t any hue n cry? (I mentioned psychological warfare in my answer)
6. Can you recall from your surroundings any instance of psychological warfare?

Member 1

1. What are implications of social media on an individual, on national level and on international level?
2. Should social media be regulated?
3. What are the current provisions in India for regulation of social media?

Member 2

1. There are some subjects in union, state and concurrent lists. Some states want a few subjects to be included in state list and vice versa. ( I said i can recall vice versa that water should be added to concurrent list)
2. Why water should be moved to concurrent list?
3. Tell me few provisions of Dam Safety Act.
4. What is interlinking of rivers and it’s pros n cons?

Member 3

1. What is the reason for establishing IITs/IIMs in each state?
2. Don’t you have IIT/IIM brand is degrading because of it?
3. What are socially relevant movies? Aren’t all movies socially relevant?
4. (*Chairperson mam) So you only watch such kind of movies? What last movie did you watch?

Member 4

1. Some question on LIC, which i can’t recall. (Not related to IPO though)
2. There is so much hue n cry over Russia in Ukraine, a European country. If Russia would have invaded any nation in West Asia, there wouldn’t have been such hue n cry. What is your take on this?
3. Yesterday, Russia was removed from Human Rights council. Told me India’s stand on it. What is your opinion on India’s stand?

Thank you. Your interview is over