Meet IAS officer Anju Sharma, failed in school exams, cracked UPSC at 22 in first attempt

IAS Anju Sharma started her career as Assistant Collector, in Rajkot in 1991. She is currently Principal Secretary to Government Education Department (Higher & Technical Education), Sachivalaya, Gandhinagar.

Cracking the UPSC exams is one of the toughest things to achieve. A lot of hard work, perseverance, and patience is needed to clear the Civil Services exam. Today, we will tell you about IAS officer Anju Sharma’s grit, who had failed in a few subjects in Class 12 but then went on to achieve success by clearing the UPSC exam at the age of 22. She turned her failure into one of her biggest successes.

Anju Sharma had failed the Economics Paper in Class 12 and also failed her pre-boards in chemistry in Class 10. Apart from these two subjects, she passed all the others with distinction. She said that no one prepares you for failures but only success.

She, however, believes that these two incidents in her life shaped her future. A leading daily once quoted Anju Sharma as saying, “During my pre-boards, I had so many chapters to cover and it was almost post-dinner when I started panicking because I was unprepared and I knew I was going to fail. Everyone around me stressed the fact that how the performance of 10th grade is crucial as it determines our higher studies.”

Anju said that during such a difficult time in her life, her mother stood by her side and motivated her. She also learned the lesson that one shouldn’t depend on last-minute studies which is why she started preparing for the college exams in advance which helped her become a gold medalist in her college. She completed her BSc and her MBA from Jaipur.

This strategy also helped her crack the UPSC exam on the first attempt. She completed her syllabus well in advance and got placed on the list of IAS toppers.

Anju started her career as Assistant Collector, in Rajkot in 1991. She is currently Principal Secretary to Government Education Department (Higher & Technical Education), Sachivalaya, Gandhinagar.

She has held various posts like DDO Baroda, as Gandhinagar, District Collector, and also in the Ministry of Industry and Commerce, Government of India; NRHM in three decades of her service.