If Phase 1 is on June 13 and you have 10 days left, the question isn't whether you can cover everything — you can't. The real question is: which 20% of current affairs content will appear in 80% of the questions? For RBI Grade B Phase 1, that answer is more specific than most candidates realize. This guide is a working professional's plan for RBI Grade B current affairs preparation in 10 days — built around what the exam actually tests, not what feels comprehensive to study.

What RBI Grade B Phase 1 Actually Tests in Current Affairs

Phase 1 has 200 marks across four sections. General Awareness carries 80 marks — the single largest section. Within that, RBI-specific current affairs, monetary policy, banking regulation, and economic developments consistently dominate. Candidates who treat General Awareness as a trivia round almost always underperform. Those who study it as applied economics tend to surprise themselves.

The exam doesn't ask you to recall headlines. It asks you to understand implications. A question on the RBI's February 2026 rate cut won't just ask the rate — it'll test whether you understand why the MPC shifted stance, what it signals about inflation trajectory, and how it connects to liquidity management. That's a different preparation posture entirely.

In the 2024 Phase 1 notification cycle, candidates who cleared the General Awareness cutoff with 55+ out of 80 almost uniformly reported spending focused time on RBI circulars, MPC minutes, and Economic Survey chapters — not just monthly current affairs PDFs.

This matters because it shapes where your 10 days go.

The 10-Day Current Affairs Study Plan for Working Professionals

You have roughly 45–60 minutes per day. That's not a constraint to apologize for — it's the reality this plan is built around. The structure below assumes two working weeks with weekends offering slightly more time.

Days 1–3: Monetary Policy and RBI Actions (Last 12 Months)

Start with your highest-yield zone. The MPC meets six times a year, and at least two questions per exam cycle trace directly to its decisions and rationale.

• Study the rate trajectory since early 2025 — the cut cycle, the pause, the reasoning at each meeting
• Understand the February 2026 50 bps cumulative cut context: inflation easing, growth concerns, global spillovers
• Know the current repo rate, SDF rate, MSF rate, and CRR off the top of your head
• Read the MPC's own language on stance shifts — "withdrawal of accommodation" to "neutral" to the current posture

The RBI MPC June 2026 LIVE: Repo Rate Held at 5.25%, FY27 Growth Cut to 6.6%, Inflation Raised to 5.1% summary gives you the exact numbers and MPC language you'll need without reading through 40 pages of minutes. For historical context, the Timeline: How RBI's repo rate has changed since June 2000 helps you see the current cycle in perspective — which is exactly the kind of analytical framing Phase 1 tests.

Days 4–6: Banking Regulation and Financial Sector Developments

RBI's regulatory actions are heavily tested — and this is where most candidates leave marks behind because they only track big headlines, not the underlying reasoning.

• Prompt Corrective Action framework: which banks are currently under it, what triggers it, what restrictions apply
• RBI's guidelines on digital lending, FLDG arrangements, and co-lending — all active examination areas
• NBFC regulatory changes: scale-based regulation, upper layer classification
• Any major bank licensing, payment bank updates, or small finance bank conversions in the last 12 months
• Priority sector lending targets and the current agricultural credit picture

Don't try to memorize every circular. Focus on understanding the regulatory intent behind each major change — that's what the question stem will test.

Days 7–8: Macro Data and Government Economic Initiatives

This is your density zone — a lot of numbers, a lot of schemes, and limited time. Be ruthless about prioritization.

• GDP growth: Q3 and Q4 FY25 actuals, FY26 projections from RBI, IMF, World Bank — and why they differ
• CPI inflation: current trajectory, food vs core split, RBI's 4% target and the recent path toward it
• Current account deficit, forex reserves (current level, all-time high context), and rupee movement narrative
• Union Budget 2025-26: fiscal deficit target (4.4% of GDP), capital expenditure allocation (₹11.11 lakh crore), and the revenue vs. capital spend debate
• Key flagship schemes with recent updates: PM Gati Shakti, PLI sector outcomes, PMAY-U progress data

Two hours here is enough if you're studying the right sources. Monthly PDF compilations with 200 pages of undifferentiated content are not the right source for this phase of preparation.

Days 9–10: Revision and Targeted MCQ Practice

Don't study new material in the last two days. This sounds obvious — it almost never happens in practice.

• Day 9: Revisit all factual anchors — rates, targets, scheme data, regulatory thresholds. Use your notes, not fresh reading.
• Day 10: 40–50 General Awareness MCQs from previous RBI Grade B papers. Track which topic clusters you're dropping marks in, not your overall score.
• Identify two or three weak areas and spend 20 minutes each on targeted revision — not a full re-read.

The goal of Day 10 is calibration, not coverage.

The ESI Paper: Why Current Affairs Preparation Has a Second Layer

This matters even for Phase 1 preparation psychology. The Economic and Social Issues paper in Phase 2 tests current affairs at a depth that no newspaper covers adequately. Candidates who clear Phase 1 and then scramble for ESI preparation lose three to four weeks they didn't need to lose.

If you're studying monetary policy for Phase 1, you're already building the foundation for ESI questions on inflation targeting frameworks, RBI's dual mandate tensions, and financial inclusion metrics. That's not extra work — it's the same work serving two purposes. RBI Governor Sanjay Malhotra's statements on financial stability are exactly the kind of primary source that bridges both phases.

Candidates who understand this compound return of their Phase 1 preparation tend to approach the 10 days with more deliberateness and less panic.

What to Use and What to Skip in 10 Days

Being honest about this matters more than being diplomatic. With 45 minutes a day, you cannot afford inefficient sources.

• Skip: Full newspaper reading — at 45 minutes per edition, The Hindu is a poor investment at this stage. It's an excellent publication, but it's not built for exam-specific retrieval.
• Skip: 200-page monthly PDFs — the signal-to-noise ratio is too low for a 10-day window.
• Skip: YouTube videos over 15 minutes — passive consumption doesn't build recall.
• Use: RBI's own press releases and MPC resolution documents — 2–3 pages each, extremely high exam yield.
• Use: RBI Annual Report 2024-25 executive summary — specifically the sections on monetary management and financial stability.
• Use: Crux's exam-specific topic layers, which give you the factual anchor, the analytical context, and the exact examiner angle for RBI Grade B in one place — designed for exactly this kind of constrained time window.

The 10-day constraint isn't the problem. Studying the wrong things efficiently is the problem. A clear prioritization framework matters more than more study hours at this stage.

You have 10 days. The exam tests depth on a narrow set of topics, not breadth across everything. Build that depth systematically, protect your last two days for revision, and don't let anxiety convert into unfocused reading. That's the plan.