After a month of anxious moments and few sleepless nights, the GATE results are finally declared. The people who get a good rank(below 200) feel accomplished; the ones with not so good ranks (200-500) are satisfied but not sure if they could make it to the Top five IIT’s in their desired specializations or not. The people with ranks greater than 500 start thinking about new IIT’s/NIT’s/BITS. All this leads to lots of confusion among the minds of the students; Which IIT’s to apply? Which specialization to apply? Which specialization is good in which IIT? Most of the students feel almost helpless and in their attempt to gain some answers start browsing net looking for Institute rankings, previous year cut-off scores, etc .To add to the anxiety of students comes other things like BARC, ISRO, IES and many more.
Well, I also faced the same situation as everyone does .Since my score was good, I felt that my job is done and didn’t do much research before applying to different courses. But I was wrong!! GATE result is only 50% of the story; the other 50% and the more important stuff is applying carefully and preparing well for the interviews. For those of you who got a rank below 500 and are confident that you will easily get an IIT; believe me it’s not a cakewalk for you. You need to prepare well for the interviews and deliver your best. Unfortunately, most of us realise it much later. I received no guidance from anywhere (neither my friends nor internet) and so I made a few mistakes( fortunately they didn’t cost me much 😉 ) I want to share my experiences and my mistakes with you so that all of you can make a wise and informed decision.
So let me start by giving details about my GATE exam:
AIR: 189
Score: 859/1000
Marks: 69.32/100(normalized)
Paper: EC (Electronics & Communication Engg)
Year: 2014
Category: General
Preparation:
I prepared for GATE along with my job and believe me it was quite difficult period for me. After working 9 hours a day at office you don’t feel like studying at all when you come home. All you want to do is to lie down,may be surf net,watch a series;but the last thing you want to do is to open a book and study Electromagnetic Theory :P.On weekends, you feel like you have lots of time and sleep initially, go out with your friends for dinner or movie later, read a novel and boom you wake up to realize that today is Monday. This cycle keeps on repeating. Your salary at the end of the month does wonders to add to your lack of motivation to study.
To avoid these distractions and to keep me focussed on my aim, I decided to join the evening classes at ACE Academy, Hyderabad. So after working hard at office I went to attend two hours of coaching. I wouldn’t say that coaching is essential for GATE but for me it provided the necessary environment to analyse my competition, to know my weaknesses and work harder to remove them. I devoted the last month in practising previous year’s question papers and paid emphasis on accuracy rather than speed. I will not go into the details of my preparation (that will be the subject of another post in the future I guess).In the coming sections I will be sharing my detailed Post GATE experiences with you.
Applications:
Institutes applied | Program | Mode of Entry |
IISc Bangalore | ME/MTech, Research Program | ME: Directly based on GATE scoreMTech(CEDT):Written Test/Interview |
IIT Bombay | MTech TA ,RA | TA: Directly based on GATE scoreRA: Written Test/Interview |
IIT Delhi | MTech | Interview |
IIT Kanpur | MTech | Interview |
IIT Madras | MTech | Directly based on GATE score |
IIT Kharagpur | MTech | Directly based on GATE score |
BARC | OCES/DGFS | Interview |
Do’s & Dont’s:
- Prepare a ready to refer notebook containing all the important concepts and formulas written briefly for all subjects. Most of us feel lazy enough to do so but believe me this practise will prove to be very useful for revision both before GATE and before Interviews.
- Do not completely abandon your books and notes after giving GATE ( as I did).You will not only lose your grip over concepts but it will also affect your confidence and speed while answering questions in the interview.
- Keep a note of all the important dates of applications, interviews, etc. I will advise you to prepare a chart containing a list of all the Institutes, courses, last dates, etc. for your reference. If possible do an advanced booking of trains/buses/flights for reaching your interview venue.
- While applying to the courses and choosing your preferences make sure to go by your interests and not what others say is the best branch. Remember you have to study this for two years and it will decide your future. So, keep all this in mind before choosing the preferences. If you are still not so sure, rank them based on the feedback of your seniors who are studying there.
- If you don’t feel like studying for interviews from your notes and books (which I did) try browsing interview questions on the internet. I came across a lot of wonderful sites full of tricky questions and good explanations of concepts.
- Reach the venue one day in advance and try to familiarize yourself with the local landscape which will help you getting to your destination the next day. Try talking to students there about the facilities and whatever doubts you have in mind.
- Lastly, do not take much stress. Enjoy yourself in the wonderful campuses of the most reputed institutions of the country and imagine being an IITan 🙂
I found very few blogs relating their interview experiences at different IIT’s; but the few I found gave me an idea about the type of questions asked and the strategies; though I always felt something missing. So, I have decided to provide a fairly descriptive and systematic account of my interview experiences at each Institute individually along with some unknown facts and my observations (important points to remember) in the coming sections. Hope this helps you in your preparation. So, stay tuned and enjoy reading 🙂 🙂
Nice… This helps a lot for the “wanderers” :)…
Looking forward to your experiences in each institute..
Also please provide links to the online resources you speak of… Will be a big help for lazy people like us 😀
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Thanks 🙂 I have provided the links in the Conclusion post as I couldn’t find individual institute wise experiences. Please check the conclusion post for consolidated list of links for interview preparation and experiences.Also,I will put up a post on GATE preparation which will also contain links to some useful online resources which will help in prep 🙂
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Thank you so much and i am eagerly waiting for ur post related to gate preparation
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Hi Ramesh !! Please don’t thank me.. the pleasure is truly mine 🙂 I have already put up a post on Gate preparation. You can check it out by clicking this URL : https://musingsofadreamydetective.wordpress.com/2014/07/12/gate-preparation/
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Thanks for sharing you are experienced with us …
Hope so it will help us a lot..
If you don’t mind then please share some books with us from which you learned.
Or how to prepared for gate?
And any thing you want to share with us..
Tell us some website whivh having all data related to gate….
Thank you..
And all the best..
I am waiting for you are replay.
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Hi Reshma…I am glad that you liked the post 🙂 Regarding books and preparation I will write a separate post soon.:)
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thanks for sharing experience with us………..
i am new to this page can u help me
i wrote gate-14(ee)…but i got only 8.57 marks…and now iam preparing for gate-15 and i took coaching In MADEEASY…i want to crack in PSUs…i hav little basics on yhe subjects…send me the preparation tips to crack in gate-15……hoping best
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Hi Chidambaram!! I have been getting many requests to post more about preparations..will surely write a post regarding that. I am sure you will be crack GATE if you work hard and do not loose focus.All the best !! 🙂
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well described. I am sure your experience will help many students in future. Step-wise doubts and their clarification, especially do and don’t are appreciable.
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Thanks a lot mummy 🙂 Yeah I hope the students will benefit from this
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Vow ! Now, you are becoming a Councillor. This is wonderful to describe your heartfelt feelings and experiences. Your journey to GATE and post GATE is really a difficult one. Probably you forgot to mention those tired and long Sundays and sometimes other days at ACE, Hyderabad when you were there since 6.00 AM to 9.00 PM continuously. Anyhow, you are a brave girl who overcame all this and finally got your destination to be an iitian.
Very well written and will help many others.
————Your proud father
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Thanks a lot papa 🙂 It wouldn’t have been possible without yours and mummy’s care and encouragement. You always supported me in my decisions. I have decided to write a separate post on my preparation time..will include my special Sundays in them 😉
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Great post Disha…I am failure of GATE 2014 ECE 15 MORNING SESSION..My strategy went wrong solving the question..In many go I couldnt attempt much rather I had good preparation ..but still the same enthusiasm incurs on me as I saw your post will definetly this time I get good rank to make my dream cometure to be an IISCian..as my friend RAKESH KANDE AIR 1 2012 ece has been helping me since two year..Your post is not a single substitute ..I am too confident this time and doing well preparation as I find any doubt I shall be back to keep here for better clarification behalf you..
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All the best Dheeraj !! I am sure if you work hard you will definitely crack GATE. I am here to clear your doubts 🙂
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very well shared experience.
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Thanks 🙂
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Nice 😃 this will help me soon.
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Thanks nadeem 🙂
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i want to follow you on facebook please help me my mail is nadeemansari145@gmail.com
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Hey , Nice post .Thanks sharing experience ! but i have a problem ,
I am 3rd year CSE undergraduate student from gujarat , are there any batches in vacations ?Because i have heard that ACE is pretty good . So i want to study there but along with my current semester , i can’t go for it ! So what should i ,Any other way to do coaching at there? I am thinking to buy postal coaching , would it be sufficient ?
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Thanks Karan 🙂 Yeah as far as I know you can buy the whole ACE material including classroom practice questions and study material + previous year’s GATE questions for all subjects. Take that and also join online test series of ACE. Along with this, concentrate more on the textbooks which u r following in college. If you study your subjects in college well,u just need to revise them and practice problems 1-2 months before GATE.
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Very Well written blog, i definitely feel it will help many GATE aspirant. I wish you all the very best in counselling thousand of students who are preparing for GATE exams. Very helpful article, Also i encourage all the GATE aspirants to get benefited by this article. Kudos to you disha.
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Ty so much 🙂 Thanks for reading all my posts and giving feedback on each of them 🙂
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will u plz provide me ur e-books n ACE academy notes through mail ?….plz help me.. My email id is siddu7733@gmail.com 🙂
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Hi Siddhesh..I would be very glad to help you but its very difficult to mail you the material as most of it is available as hard copy.You can refer to the online resources and online versions of the books I mentioned in my posts 🙂
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ok…no problm…….yaa I got materials throu online search…..thanku… 🙂
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mam! did u evaluate your exam?..after giving it..! i mean before results! if so, then how many questions wer correct nd wrong..? wer they same as u expected wen results came out!… m expecting a detailed answer mam!
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Hi abhishek…Nah I didn’t evaluate my exam at all..didn’t even look at the solutions or anything..just keep calm and relax till the time the result is declared 🙂
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ma’am my gate score(2017) is 686 and AIR 1145. Please help me in which IITs program I can apply. Although I know some, but I want to know the one in which placement is good. Also, on this rank, whether I get a call from IITB RA or not?
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