“An amputee who lost her leg in an accident, Arunima Sinha climbed the peak of Mount Everest. Her firm resolve to conquer Mount Everest was the best example to prove that everything is possible, if you put all your strength into doing it,’’ says Sikha Surendran, who has secured 16th rank in this year’s Civil Services Examination. Sikha, who has taken Malayalam as her optional subject is also the Kerala topper in the examinations.
The determined 24-year-old civil engineer, who hails from Kavanakkudiyil house in the small hamlet of Vadayampady in Ernakulam district, followed the State school curriculum in English medium. She credits her success in the exam to hard work and dedication.
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The strong support extended by her sick father, K.K.Surendran, and mother, Silo Surendran, was the main motivating factor behind her success story, she says. Sikha’s optimism came to the fore when she recalled the saying that, “No one was born better than you, but it was their hard work that made them better.’’
She says pursuing B.Tech was her plan B and, after that, she fully devoted two years for her Civil Services preparation. “Enough study material was available online and it helped me immensely. Coaching classes at the Samkalp centre in Delhi, Pala Civil Service Academy and at the Amrita Civil Service Academy in Thiruvananthapuram too helped ,” she adds.
Sikha says she mainly depended on the Amrita Civil Service Academy for mock interviews and found that useful at the UPSC interview. She adds that it is important that one allows positive thoughts enter one’s mind. Quoting Rabindranath Tagore, she says, “You cannot cross the sea merely by standing and staring at the water.” Everything is possible if you put all of your strength into doing it, she says .
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Hobbies
Reading, especially poetry, and singing are Sikha’s favourite hobbies . ONV Kurup is her preferred poet and his two masterpieces, Bhoomikkoru Charamageethom and Kesamithu Kanduvo , her best-loved poems.
Tips to aspirants
Sikha believes self-study forms the key part in the preparation for Civil Services exam. “The preparation is a long process. What to study, what not to study, and how to study, are the first three basic things the aspirants should consider. Then comes confidence, hard work, and practice. We have to set our mind in such a way as to recall and reproduce all what we have studied. Solving maximum number of model test papers is another key part in the preparations,” she says.