Once upon a time…during my class 5th summer vacations, me and my brother watched the Harry Potter and the philosopher’s stone. We would often dream and discuss of having to study at a place like Hogwarts. As years passed, the idea of Hogwarts for me kept on evolving but the place was still far from reach. To my mind, Hogwarts evolved into a place where their is learning for life, where the quest for knowledge is not just academic but a transformative journey towards shaping the future, where no question is a dumb question and most importantly where it is okay to make mistakes. Little did I know that this search would end one day during my summers of 2023.

The ‘Misfits’ beginning:

Before my UPSC prelims exam 2023, i stumbled upon a video by Naman sir (a bit of a random person then!) on Gupta period. Though having read about Gupta period earlier, the way the period was covered in the video was something fascinating for me. I was more curious to know more and importantly I was trying to recall and apply whatever I had learned without getting bored. I saw few more videos of Naman sir and I was getting a sight of my ‘Hogwarts moment’ there. Though I did not join misfits then as prelims was very near, I kept his lessons with me. In one of the class he had mentioned about maintaing ‘calm like Buddha’ in stressful situation like during the examination, which I was constantly reminding myself of during the paper.

Post prelims 2023 results (which I couldn’t clear), I was much confused about the course of action and where I went wrong. During that time I decided to give one more shot and I enrolled for Naman sir’s Misfits. Usually while joining any course in which you have missed few classes there’s an anxiety about the missed part, but here at misfits, what I personally liked was when Naman sir told that ‘dont fret, each episode is a new episode, so use your conjectures to answer the questions and understand what’s being taught in class’. As months passed, I started getting a feeling of my ‘Hogwarts moment’ (Soon to become The ‘Dravid Zone’!)

Geography creates economy, Economy creates Empire and Polity sustains that Empire!

My last 1 year journey at misfits has given me a completely different perspective on the above statement.

How….

• The foundations of history, economy, geography, polity and society built via asking questions, making conjectures and analysing different empires/economies is proving like a superpower which proved really helpful during prelims 2024.
• From exam perspective, what I liked is solving pyqs of that concept then and there itself which helps concretise the concepts
• The community of like-minded peers here acts like a support system, which can be summed in words of Hellen Keller as “Alone we can do so little, together we can do so much”
• As there are no student groups formed on telegram or WhatsApp apart from LinkedIn alumni, this helped to focus on core studies and not get distracted with n number of groups and subgroups which usually happens on student portals.
• Balancing life and studies: misfits helped me learn to build a balance and to study when it’s time to study, also to relax and take a break and celebrate festivals with family eg. Holi break
• Shatakshi ma’am used to tell that sometimes it’s good to be ahead of your teacher in context of pre reads, this thing has stayed with me
• The cold calling by Naman sir helped me come out of my comfort zone of not speaking up in the class.
• Eg. during class on cyclone, the cold calling acted like a coriolis force for me that from that class onwards I try to raise my virtual hand in each class to speak up and give answers
• During prelims prep, the everyday sessions by Naman sir were like meditation session for me, that would keep me calm and composed
• It is said that a good mentor empowers a person to see a possible future, and believe it can be obtained. Naman sir has shown a possible vision and a belief of “good people occupying important position” to serve the people of this beautiful country India and its people

In the end, while misfits may lack flying broomsticks and talking portraits , the journey here for UPSC feels no enchanting. Much like Hogwarts, it is a place where ordinary individuals aspire to achieve extraordinary feats one step at a time...