Saima Khan, a resident of Ward 78 in Mominpur has emerged successful obtaining 165 rank in the prestigious Union Public Service Examination examinations.

She cleared the examination in her fourth attempt.

Having done most of her education from Kolkata, Saima shifted to Mumbai after completing her Class VIII from St Paul’s Boarding and Day School in Kidderpore as her father, Seraj Ahmed Khan wanted to transfer his business there. However, after two years, the family returned to Kolkata and Saima was admitted to Ashok Hall Girls’ Higher Secondary School for plus-two levels and then to St Xavier’s College. During her graduation, she took up sociology honours and it was then when for the first time she aspired to do something in the public services field. “I was associated with an NGO. While interacting with the people at the ground level, I realized that I wanted to do something for them if it was small,” said Saima. “For doing such things, I needed some institutional authority and it was then, I decided to clear the UPSC,” said Saima, who was a student at the Educrat IAS Academy and later joined the institute guiding other aspirants for sometime after clearing her prelims.

Talking about her journey till the results, Saima explained how she resisted social media or even social life during her preparatory period. “I would not go out to the relatives or attend marriage parties for four to five years. The only social activity that I had was meeting my childhood friends in about a month or so. I had no fixed duration of studying everyday but would spend as much time as I could on studies,” said the Kidderpore resident.

Elucidating on the challenges faced, she recalled, “Failure was the biggest challenge. After failing to clear in the three attempts, I felt like giving up almost every day but I had no plan B for my career. All my dreams were around UPSC and I knew, if there could be something, it had to be this.”

Advising the aspirants of UPSC, she said, “Be honest about yourself. If you are studying for five hours, make it a quality time rather than just a quantity time. Be consistent and focus on your preparations without bothering too much about the results.”