MSBSHSE Books for Class 12 Information Technology (Information Technology (Arts)) in English Medium

Which Book You Need: Class 12 IT for the Arts Stream

The textbook you need is Information Technology, Standard XII (Arts and Science streams have separate books), published by the Maharashtra State Board of Secondary and Higher Secondary Education for the English medium. Look for the title Information Technology on the cover with "Std. XII" printed below it, and check that the inside first page lists your stream as Arts.

This is the Arts-stream paper. It is not the same book used by Science or Commerce students. Many students lose time because a shop hands them the Science-stream IT book, which goes deeper into programming and database design. If the first page does not mention the Arts stream, you have the wrong book.

The book is written to the prescribed syllabus set by the state board, so every chapter in it is examinable. Chapters are short and practical, with screenshots and step lists, because the paper assumes you have no prior Science or Commerce background. You are not expected to write long programs, but you are expected to explain how software and digital tools work and to use them correctly.

Chapter names, marks weightage and any syllabus revision for the current academic year should be confirmed from the official board source before you plan your study [verify]. The board has revised IT syllabi in earlier years, so a copy from an older year may not match.

Last updated: 12 June 2025.

Before you buy or download anything, read our Class 12 Information Technology (Arts) syllabus page so you know exactly which chapters are in scope, then match them against the contents page of the book in your hand.

Class 12 IT (Arts) Textbook PDF Download and Official Sources

The state board publishes its own textbooks and makes them available free of cost in digital form. The PDF of your Information Technology (Arts) book is no exception: you should not pay anyone for a digital copy of a state board textbook. Download the PDF first, read it on your phone or laptop, and only then decide whether you also want a printed copy.

Where to Get the English-Medium PDF

Go to the official state board textbook portal (the site the board uses to host its ebooks, usually reached through the main board website). On the portal, select Standard XII, then the medium as English, then find Information Technology in the subject list. The Arts-stream title will be listed separately from the Science/Commerce title, so read the labels carefully before you click.

Download the file once and save it offline. Board portals sometimes slow down close to exam season, and a saved copy means you can study without depending on the network. If the portal asks you to choose between "Part 1" and "Part 2" or between volumes, download every part listed for the subject.

How to Check You Have the Correct Edition

Open the PDF and read the first two pages before you study anything. Check these four things:

• Class: it must say Std. XII (Standard 12), not Std. XI.
• Stream: it must name the Arts stream. If the cover only says "Information Technology" with no stream, check the contents page against your Class 12 Information Technology (Arts) syllabus page.
• Medium: confirm the text is in English, not Marathi or Hindi, if you are preparing in English medium.
• Edition year: the edition or reprint year should match the current academic year. A book reprinted after a syllabus revision will have a different contents page from an older one.

Avoid PDFs shared on messaging groups, coaching blogs or file-sharing sites. These are often unauthorised scans: pages may be missing, images of screens may be blurred, and the edition may be years old. A missing page in a scanned chapter is easy to miss until an exam question comes from it.

Website addresses and download links on the board portal do change from year to year, so if a link does not open, search the official board site again rather than trusting an old link from a forum [verify]. Once your PDF is confirmed, move on to the question paper pattern and marking scheme so you know how the chapters you are about to read will be tested.

Chapter List: Class 12 Information Technology (Arts) English Medium

The Information Technology (Arts) book is organised so that the early chapters build vocabulary and awareness, and the later chapters ask you to apply that knowledge on a computer. Read the contents page of your own PDF and compare it with the table below. If a title differs by a word or two, trust your book, since the board has revised chapter titles across editions [verify].

The chapters fall into three rough groups, and knowing the group tells you how to study it.

• Concepts and awareness (Chapters 1, 2, 3, 7, 9, 10): these are read-and-recall chapters. Definitions, full forms and short differences carry most of the marks. Make a one-page list of terms for each chapter.
• Hands-on software (Chapters 4, 5, 6): you cannot score here by reading alone. Open the software named in your book, repeat each activity shown, and note the exact menu steps.
• Data handling (Chapter 8): sits between the two. Learn the vocabulary (table, record, field, primary key) and also practise creating a small table with five or six records.

A typical exam question from Chapter 5 might ask you to write the formula that adds the values in cells B2 to B6. The marks are for the correct formula syntax, not for the answer, so practise writing formulas by hand as well as on screen. A common mistake is memorising the output of a spreadsheet activity instead of the steps that produced it. The fix: after every practical, close the file and write the steps from memory in your rough notebook.

Chapter counts and titles can change when the board revises the syllabus, so cross-check this list against the Class 12 Information Technology (Arts) syllabus page and against the contents page of your downloaded PDF [verify]. Once the list matches, look at the question paper pattern and marking scheme to see which chapters carry more weight in the theory paper.

How the Arts IT Book Differs from the Science/Commerce IT Paper

Both papers are called Information Technology, so students often assume the book is the same. It is not. The Arts-stream book is written for a student who has not studied programming or business data handling before. It starts from "what is a computer used for" and builds up to simple, guided tasks on the computer. The Science/Commerce paper moves faster into code and structured data, because those students are expected to handle abstract logic and formulas as part of their other subjects.

The clearest way to see the gap is to compare how each topic is treated.

Notice the difference in what earns marks. In the Arts paper, a question like "State two uses of a spreadsheet in a shop" is marked for two correct, specific uses, not for a long answer. Students lose marks by writing a paragraph and burying the two points inside it. Write the two points as separate numbered lines.

Because the Arts book spends more time on application and awareness, the practical side matters more than it looks. A student who reads Chapter 4 but never opens the word processor will struggle to write the menu steps from memory. Treat every activity box in the book as a task to perform, not a paragraph to read.

The exact topic split between the two papers is set by the board and can change in a revision. Confirm the current scope on the Class 12 Information Technology (Arts) syllabus page before you plan your study, and check the question paper pattern and marking scheme to see how those topics are actually tested [verify].

Exam Pattern and Marks Distribution

The Information Technology (Arts) paper is marked on two separate heads: a written theory paper and a practical plus internal assessment component. Your final grade is a combination of both, so a strong theory score cannot rescue a weak practical file, and the reverse is also true. The exact split between theory and practical marks changes with board circulars, so treat the numbers below as the usual pattern and confirm the current figures on the Class 12 Information Technology (Arts) syllabus page [verify].

Theory Paper Structure

The theory paper is a single written exam of 3 hours [verify]. Questions are set in sections of increasing difficulty, and the paper mixes one-line answers with short explanations and step-writing tasks. A typical question asks you to "write the steps" for a software action, or to "state two uses" of a tool. Marks are awarded per correct point, not per line written, so a five-mark answer usually needs five distinct points or steps.

Here is the question pattern most Arts IT papers follow:

The total theory marks and the exact mark per question are fixed by the board each year. Before you start revising, download the official exam pattern circular from the board site and compare it with the question paper pattern and marking scheme.

Practical and Internal Assessment

The practical exam is conducted at your school by an external examiner. You are given a task to perform on the computer, such as creating a document, inserting a table, or preparing a simple spreadsheet, and marks are given for correct steps, the final output and your viva answers [verify]. Internal assessment covers your practical file, journal entries and project work, marked by your school teacher through the year.

Keep two things ready for the practical: a complete file with screenshots of each activity, and the ability to explain what you did in one or two sentences. Examiners often ask "why did you use this option?" rather than "what is this button".

Chapter-Wise Study Guidance

Every chapter in the Class 12 IT (Arts) book falls into one of two groups: chapters you can learn by reading and remembering, and chapters you can only learn by sitting at a computer and doing the steps yourself. Mixing these up is the most common reason students lose marks. Reading about how to insert a table in a word processor will not help you in the practical exam; you need to have done it ten times. Below is a chapter-by-chapter plan. The chapter numbers follow the prescribed book, so match them with your copy before you start [verify].

Theory Chapters

These chapters reward careful reading, a definitions notebook and short recall tests. Do not underline the whole page; write one clean definition per term and one example beside it.

• Introduction to IT and its applications: Key concept: the difference between data, information and knowledge. Study action: make a three-column list of five real examples from a bank, a hospital and your school. Spend about 2 days.
• Computer hardware and software basics: Key concept: system software versus application software. Study action: label a diagram of input, process, output and storage devices from memory. Spend about 3 days.
• Operating system and file management: Key concept: what an operating system does (managing files, memory and devices). Study action: practise creating folders, renaming files and changing file extensions on a real computer. Spend about 3 days.
• Internet, email and web basics: Key concept: the difference between a browser, a search engine and a website. Study action: write the exact steps to attach a file to an email, because step-writing questions come from here often [verify]. Spend about 3 days.
• Cyber safety, ethics and IT law: Key concept: safe practices such as strong passwords, avoiding phishing links and protecting personal data. Study action: prepare five one-line definitions (virus, phishing, firewall, plagiarism, digital footprint). Spend about 2 days.
• Emerging technologies: Key concept: a plain-language definition of cloud computing, artificial intelligence and e-governance. Study action: keep each definition to two lines with one Indian example. Spend about 2 days.

Practical-Oriented Chapters

These chapters need hands-on practice. Book one hour at a computer for each session and keep a rough notebook beside you to record the steps as you perform them.

• Word processing: Key concept: formatting a document using styles, tables and page setup. Study action: type a two-page report with a table, a header and page numbers, then repeat it without looking at the book. Spend about 4 days.
• Spreadsheets: Key concept: cell reference, formula and the difference between a relative and absolute reference. Study action: build a marks sheet with a total column and an average column using formulas, not a calculator. Spend about 5 days.
• Presentation software: Key concept: slide layout, transitions and speaker notes. Study action: make a six-slide presentation on a topic from another subject and present it aloud once. Spend about 3 days.
• Database basics (if included in your edition): Key concept: table, record, field and primary key. Study action: create a small table of ten students and run one simple query. Spend about 4 days [verify].

A common mistake is writing a step answer as a paragraph: "First we open the file then we go to insert and then click table." The fix is to number each step on a new line, because examiners give marks per step and a jumbled paragraph hides your points. If a chapter feels hard, give it one extra day rather than rushing it; the spreadsheet and word processing chapters carry the most practical weight and also appear frequently in theory papers as step-writing questions [verify].

Using the Textbook for Practicals and Project Work

Every practical-oriented chapter in the book ends with a set of exercises and, in most cases, a worked activity. Treat those exercises as the actual practical syllabus, not as optional homework. Before you open the computer, read the activity once and note the exact menu path the book uses (for example, Insert > Table > Insert Table). Then perform it on the machine. The book tells you what to do; the machine tells you whether you can actually do it.

Keep a practical file as you go, not at the end of the year. For each activity, write four things on one page:

• The activity name and the chapter it comes from.
• Numbered steps, one action per line, in your own words.
• A screenshot of the final output, with your name or roll number visible on screen so it is clearly your work.
• One line on what went wrong the first time and how you fixed it.

That last line is worth more than it looks. Examiners and internal assessors often ask you to explain a step during the practical exam, and a student who has recorded their own errors can answer confidently. Our guide on how to prepare a practical file for Class 12 IT shows a page layout you can follow.

For project work, pick a topic that sits inside two or three textbook chapters rather than outside them. A spreadsheet-based project on a school canteen's daily sales uses the spreadsheet chapter; a small database of library members uses the database chapter; a presentation on cyber safety uses the cyber safety chapter. This keeps your reading and your project moving together. The project topics and guidelines page lists topics mapped to chapters this way.

Do not copy a project from a senior, a coaching class or a website. Assessors recognise copied work quickly, and a copied project usually collapses in the viva, where you are asked why you chose a particular formula or field. Two original pages with your own screenshots score better than ten copied pages you cannot explain.

Buying the Book: Edition, Price, and What to Check

Buy the edition printed for the current academic year. The state board reprints textbooks when the syllabus or content changes, and an older reprint can leave you studying a topic that has been dropped or missing one that has been added. The edition year is printed on the title page and often on the back cover, usually as a line like "First Edition 20XX" followed by reprint years. The most recent year on that line is the one you want.

Before you pay, open the book and check four things:

• Class: the cover and title page should say Class 12 (Standard XII), not Class 11. The Class 11 book covers different ground, so check our Class 11 Information Technology (Arts) textbook page if you are buying both.
• Stream: the title should name Information Technology (Arts). A book labelled for the Science or Commerce paper is a different textbook.
• Medium: the cover should say English Medium. If the shop only stocks the Marathi edition, ask them to order the English one rather than buying a book you cannot read comfortably.
• Publisher: the state board's textbook bureau is the publisher. A book with a private publisher's name and no board imprint is a guide, not the prescribed textbook.

The PDF from the official portal is free, so cost is never a reason to skip the textbook. A printed copy is still worth having: you can underline definitions, write margin notes next to diagrams, and stick tabs on chapters you revise often. Photocopied or spiral-bound bundles sold outside schools are often incomplete, with pages missing from the middle of a chapter.

Prices vary by seller and by whether you buy new or second-hand, so compare before buying [verify]. Second-hand copies are fine if the edition is current and the pages are intact, but avoid any copy already filled with someone else's notes, since you will read their answers instead of forming your own.

Study Plan: 8 Weeks to Cover the Class 12 IT (Arts) Syllabus

Eight weeks is enough if you study IT for about 75 to 90 minutes on weekdays and three hours on one weekend day. The plan below assumes the textbook has roughly eight units; if your book has more or fewer chapters, shift the chapter names into the nearest week and keep the revision weeks fixed. Confirm the exact chapter count against the Class 12 Information Technology (Arts) syllabus page before you start.

Each week follows the same rhythm: read the chapter once without a pen, read it again with a notebook open, then attempt the exercise questions before looking at any guide. On Saturday, spend 30 minutes on a self-test of 15 questions drawn from that week's chapters. On Sunday, correct the mistakes and add them to a single "error page" at the back of your notebook. That page is what you revise in Week 8, not the whole book.

Check the question paper pattern and marking scheme in Week 4 so your self-tests match the real paper's sections and marks.

If you start late, say with four weeks left, compress the plan: two chapters per week, practicals finished in the first ten days, and the last week kept entirely for revision. Drop nothing from the practical file, because it carries marks you cannot recover later. Students who begin in the final fortnight should read the chapter summaries and solve the last three years' papers rather than attempt a full first reading.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

Most marks lost in Information Technology are not lost because a topic was too hard. They are lost through a handful of avoidable habits. Here are the ones that appear most often, with the reason each one costs marks and the fix you can apply this week.

• Treating practicals as a formality. Practical and internal assessment carry a separate block of marks, and a thin or incomplete file pulls that score down even if your theory paper is strong. Fix: finish one practical per week from the start, and record the steps, commands and screenshots as you go, not at the end. Our guide on how to prepare a practical file for Class 12 IT shows the expected format.
• Skipping definitions and full forms. Questions that ask you to define a term or expand an abbreviation are direct-mark questions. Writing a rough explanation instead of the exact definition usually earns partial credit at best. Fix: keep a one-page list of definitions per chapter and write each one in your own words.
• Studying from an old edition. An outdated print may miss revised chapters or changed exercise questions, so you prepare content that is no longer examined and miss content that is. Fix: match the edition year on the first page with the current academic year, and cross-check the chapter list on the Class 12 Information Technology (Arts) syllabus page.
• Ignoring the paper pattern until the last month. If you have never solved a paper in the real section order and time limit, you lose marks to poor time split and unattempted questions. Fix: check the question paper pattern and marking scheme early and solve one full paper under timing.
• Copying a project from a senior or a website. Examiners ask questions on your own project during the viva, and a copied project collapses under two or three questions. Fix: pick a topic tied to a textbook chapter you understand well, and be ready to explain every screen and step.

Quick Revision: Key Terms and Concepts

Use this table in the last week before the paper. Each definition is written the way an examiner expects it in a two-mark question: one clear sentence, no extra padding. Cover the right-hand column, read the term, and say the definition aloud. If you can do that for all fifteen without looking, your direct-mark questions are secured.

Two habits make this list work. First, write each definition once by hand, because spelling of full forms such as DBMS and GUI is checked. Second, when a question says "explain with an example", add one line after the definition, for example "B4 in a spreadsheet is a cell reference." That single line often separates a full mark from half a mark. If your textbook words a definition differently from the table above, follow your textbook, and confirm the exact chapter wording against the Class 12 Information Technology (Arts) syllabus page [verify].

Frequently Asked Questions

Where can I download the MSBSHSE Class 12 Information Technology (Arts) textbook PDF in English medium?

The state board provides free PDFs of its textbooks on its official website. Look for the e-textbook section and select Class 12, then Information Technology (Arts) and English medium. Avoid paying for digital copies. Always verify the source is the official board site. [verify]

Is the Class 12 Information Technology book for Arts different from the Science stream book?

Yes, the Arts and Science streams have separate Information Technology textbooks. The Arts book is designed for students without a Science or Commerce background and focuses on practical digital tools rather than deep programming. Always check that the book's first page mentions your stream to avoid buying the wrong one.

How many chapters are there in the Class 12 IT (Arts) textbook?

The exact number of chapters can vary as the board updates the syllabus. To find the current chapter count, check the official board website or the contents page of the latest textbook. The chapters are short and practical, covering essential IT skills for the Arts stream. [verify]

What is the exam pattern and marks distribution for Class 12 Information Technology?

The exam pattern and marks distribution are set by the state board and may change. For the current academic year, refer to the official board website or your school for the latest details. The paper typically includes theory and practical components, but confirm the weightage from official sources. [verify]

Is the MSBSHSE Class 12 IT book available in English medium for all chapters?

Yes, the state board publishes the Information Technology (Arts) textbook in English medium covering all prescribed chapters. The PDF version is also available in English. Ensure you download the English medium edition from the official source to match your study needs.

Which edition of the Class 12 IT textbook should I buy for the current academic year?

Always buy the latest edition prescribed for the current academic year. The board may revise the syllabus, so an older edition might not match. Check the board's official website for the current edition, or ask your school. The latest edition ensures you study the correct content. [verify]