The importance of current affairs in the UPSC examination cannot be overstated. Questions in the prelims, mains, and interviews are often based on current affairs, which refers to anything relevant to our syllabus that is in the news. This could include government policies, programs, achievements, and anything important related to India or the world.

The reason current affairs are so important is that the UPSC wants to test the awareness of students of their surroundings. Current happenings are closely related to governance, which is something we will be a part of, so it is of great interest to the UPSC. Therefore, it is essential to be familiar with current affairs.

However, covering current affairs can be challenging because multiple events occur around the world every day, and it is impossible to keep track of everything. Making daily notes can also become difficult, so it can be problematic to cover them holistically. But we can cover it to the best of our ability for our exam's necessity.

To prepare for current affairs, we can follow a step-by-step approach. The first step is to read a daily newspaper such as The Hindu or The Indian Express and make notes of the most important news items from a prelims point of view. This could include any significant place or event, government scheme, policy or program, or any national park or Ramsar site in the news.

Additionally, we can follow an online medium such as Insights, which provides daily current affairs from a prelims point of view. This will cover our daily current affairs.

The second step is to cover the current affairs of the month by reading a monthly current affairs magazine of GS SCORE. This will help us cover news items that were not included in our daily notes, mainly related to the environment, science, and technology.

For the third step, we will focus on exam-specific preparation. For prelims, we can follow sources such as PT GS SCORE for Environment and Economics, daily current affairs quiz, and PIB gist.

For mains, daily note-making is not as important as prelims, and we can skip editorials if necessary. We can rely on GS Mains Classes 2024 by GS Score as trusted and tested sources for mains.

For interview preparation, we can cover current affairs happening at the time of the interview by reading newspapers such as The Hindu, The Indian Express, and TOI.

It is essential to strictly adhere to the syllabus while preparing for current affairs, and while it is impossible to cover everything, we should aim to cover as much as possible. Limiting our sources is best, and we can add more sources as per our time constraints.

All the best!