“I wrote essays every single day...”: How IAS officer Ananya Singh cracked UPSC at just 22 without any coaching

For many UPSC aspirants, the Civil Services Examination feels like a marathon that demands years of coaching, endless study material and sleepless nights. But IAS officer Ananya Singh proved that there is no single formula for success.At just 22, she cleared one of India's toughest exams on her very first attempt, landing All India Rank 51 in the 2019 UPSC Civil Services Examination. According to News24 and various media sources, IAS officer Ananya recently took over as Additional CEO of Bihar's flagship rural livelihood programme, JEEViKA, which has brought her journey back into the spotlight. As per Navbharat Times and various media reports, Ananya grew up in Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh. She studied at St. Mary's Convent School, where she consistently ranked among the toppers. Her marks tell their own story: She scored 96% in Class 10 and 98.25% in Class 12, topping her district under the CISCE board. But for Ananya, good grades were never the end goal. She already knew exactly what she wanted to become: an IAS officer.After school, she moved to Delhi to study Economics (Honours) at Shri Ram College of Commerce. Rather than wait for graduation to end before starting her UPSC prep, she began during her final year itself. About a year of focused preparation later, she sat for the 2019 Civil Services Examination, and cleared it on her first try, with AIR 51. She was 22.A lot of aspirants assume more hours at the desk automatically mean better results. Ananya didn't buy into that. As per some interviews, she studied seven to eight hours a day in the early stages of her preparation. Once she'd gotten a good grip on the syllabus, she actually cut that down to about six hours a day. For her, it was never about how long she sat with her books. It was about staying consistent, day after day. If there's one habit that shaped her prep more than anything else, it's answer writing. Instead of just reading books and making notes, Ananya made it a point to practise writing full answers and essays regularly.Her advice to aspirants is to pay real attention to structure. "Candidates should always give priority to improving the introduction, body and conclusion formula in their answers," she says.Writing daily didn't just make her faster, it helped her organise her thoughts, which turned out to be crucial for the Mains exam.Education has always run deep in Ananya's family. Her father was a District Judge, and her mother, Anjali Singh, is a senior lecturer. Growing up around that kind of environment, it's not hard to see where her pull toward UPSC came from. Ananya's story hasn't stayed confined to her UPSC success, she continues to inspire thousands of aspirants through her work and the journey that got her here. She's fairly active on Instagram too, where she shares glimpses of her professional life.She tied the knot with fellow IAS officer Kumar Anurag in April 2024, who himself ranked AIR 48 in the 2018 Civil Services Examination. And most recently, she took office as Additional CEO of Bihar's JEEViKA programme, a scheme aimed at empowering rural women through self-help groups and livelihood support.Ananya Singh's story is not one of overnight success or some stroke of luck. It comes down to discipline, planning and simply showing up each and every day. For the thousands of young women with their eyes set on the civil services, her journey is proof of the fact that a clear goal, smart preparation and steady effort can take you a long way, even at 22.