TNPSC Group 4 · CCSE-IV

TNPSC Group 4 syllabus and paper pattern

குரூப் 4 தேர்வு அமைப்பு, மதிப்பெண் பிரிவு, பாடத்திட்டம்.

Check the official notification before you rely on any of this. The pattern below follows the current Combined Civil Services Examination IV notification. TNPSC changes it between cycles, and the notification on tnpsc.gov.in is the only version that counts.

How the 300 marks are split

One objective paper, answered on an OMR sheet, in Tamil or English. Three hours, 200 questions, 300 marks — so every question is worth one and a half marks, and there is no negative marking. That last point changes how you should sit the paper: a blank answer and a wrong answer score the same, so there is never a reason to leave one.

PartQuestionsMarks

General Studies75112.5

Aptitude & Mental Ability2537.5

General Tamil or General English100150

Total200300

Read that table once more, because it is the whole strategy. Half the paper is the language part. Most candidates spend most of their time on General Studies, which is the smaller half — and then lose the post by four marks in a section they assumed they already knew.

General Studies, in the order it is usually asked

General science — physics, chemistry, botany, zoology at school level, and the applied questions that come from them.
Current events — national and Tamil Nadu, with the state questions weighted more heavily than aspirants expect.
Geography — India and Tamil Nadu: rivers, soil, crops, minerals, transport, disasters.
History and culture of India — with the Tamil Nadu portions, the Sangam age and the Dravidian movement carrying real weight.
Indian polity — the Constitution, the Union and the states, local government, rights and duties.
Indian economy — planning, agriculture, industry, state finance, the welfare schemes a Village Administrative Officer actually administers.
Indian national movement — the national picture and the Tamil Nadu figures within it.
History, culture, heritage and socio-political movements in Tamil Nadu — a section of its own, and the one most often under-prepared.
Development administration in Tamil Nadu — the human development indicators, the schemes, the delivery machinery.

Aptitude and Mental Ability

Twenty-five questions, and the most recoverable marks on the paper: simplification, percentage, HCF and LCM, ratio, time and work, time and distance, menstruation, data interpretation, logical reasoning, number series, coding and decoding, calendar and clock. It is the section where practice moves a score fastest, because the question types repeat.

The language paper — where the post is usually decided

One hundred questions, 150 marks, and you choose Tamil or English when you apply. General Tamil covers grammar, literature, the history of the language and comprehension. General English covers grammar, vocabulary, literature and comprehension. Whichever you pick, this is the part to test yourself on weekly rather than to read through once.

What to do with this

A syllabus tells you what may be asked. It does not tell you which of it you actually know, and that is the gap this site exists to close: take a free full-length paper, and the report afterwards names the sub-topics costing you marks and whether the problem is knowledge, speed or nerves.

Take a free Group 4 test Group 4 cut-off marks →