How I Made It To IIM Calcutta | Palash Godbole, CAT 2019 99.35%ile

I was born and brought up in a small town called Pusad in the state of Maharashtra. I completed my graduation from the College of Engineering Pune in 2018. In the final year of my engineering, I got placed in a software company in Bangalore through campus placements. I came to know about CAT in the third year of my engineering. Being an engineer with mediocre graduation scores, I was daunted by the experiences of people who have been through the MBA admission process in India. I was taken aback by the knowledge that it’s very difficult to get into an IIM with low graduation scores and not a stellar profile. However, there was a tiny ray of hope that with a high percentile in CAT and a good interview you can get into one of the prestigious IIMs. I gave CAT’17 with little preparation and my performance was not up to the mark. The percentile score of just 70 was not enough to get me anywhere. So I decided to give CAT one more shot. I had started working in Bangalore in July’18. Till then I had not even started preparing for CAT’18. The organization had mandatory training for all the new joinees wherein regular sessions were being held from 9-6 for 6 days a week making it difficult to find time for studies. Also, being from a non-IT background I had to devote extra time after training for better performance in the tests. The training ended on the 7^th September and by that time I had not started preparing. I was troubled with the thought that I am not getting into a B-school this year. In my mind, I had already given up. This was, as far as I remember the lowest time of my life. I was battling with myself. I had thoughts of leaving my job and preparing full time for CAT however I wasn’t sure whether 2 months was enough time for acing CAT. Talking to my friends and parents had helped me a lot in that period. Somehow I collected myself and started preparing in the latter half of September. I used to study regularly on weekdays and give mocks on weekends. I managed to score 93.93 percentile in CAT’18 but this wasn’t enough again. However, I had gained confidence in myself by that time and I was sure that with proper preparation I could score 98-99 percentile (still was not sure about 99+). After CAT, I prepared for MAH-CET and scored 99.53 percentile, however, I couldn't get into JBIMS. So I decided to quit my job and prepare rigorously for CAT’19. I came back to Pune and joined a local coaching institute. I started preparing in mid-July ’19. During the initial days, I began with topic wise quant questions, 3-4 DI-LR sets, and 4-5 reading comprehensions daily. Along with that, I was doing a 2-hour class on weekdays. Eventually, I discovered that VA-RC was my weakest section. I was good in quants and DI-LR. I started focusing more on VA-RC, specifically on reading comprehension as it carries more weightage in the VA-RC section. I used to read regularly, be it newspaper articles or articles on sites like aeon.co and aldaily.com. Also, solving passages from different areas and getting acquainted with them helped me to some extent. In the first few mocks, I did not score well in VARC. I was not good either at accuracy or attempts. Initially, I tried improving my accuracy however that didn’t work out well. The real progress in score was observed after I increased my attempts while maintaining an accuracy of 70-75%. In the last 2 weeks before CAT I saw my VARC scores in the range of 60-70 marks. In DI-LR, I was sure about solving 4 sets on any given day. So, I kept a target of a minimum of 5 sets in all the mocks. On the Final D-Day, I managed to solve five and a half sets and achieved 99.39 percentile. In the infamous DILR section, set selection is the key. It will save you from unnecessarily spending time on difficult sets. Much like DI-LR, quant was also my strength. However, I was not able to score marks in mocks. So instead of spending time on difficult questions, I started picking up easy questions first and focused on accuracy. This gave me the early confidence which is necessary and thereby increasing my attempts as well as the score. I attempted 28 questions out of 34 in the final exam and achieved 99.82 percentile in quants. Overall I scored 99.35 percentile. I had interview calls from IIM A, C, L, K, S, and New IIMs. Apart from that, I had calls from FMS, SP Jain, IIFT, and NITIE. Out of these, I have been offered admission in IIM C, K, FMS, IIFT, NITIE, and New IIMs. Most of my interview experiences were good. For interviews, it’s important to know whatever you write on the application form of the respective institute. The B-School interviews are random most of the time, however, there are few areas on your profile from which the questions can always be expected. In my Calcutta interview, there were questions related to the Hackathon idea which I had mentioned in my introduction, some discussion on COVID-19, whereas maximum questions were asked about the recent events in the telecommunication sector in India and 5G Technology.

Some key takeaways from my interview experiences

• Keep yourself calm and composed during the interview. Present yourself well and be confident.
• Do not say anything wrong confidently. Be straight in your answers. It’s okay to accept not knowing something rather than answering incorrectly.
• Know everything about yourself and be ready for cross-questions.

And always keep a smile on your face :)

DO’s

• Identify both your strong and weak areas. Work on your weak area and learn from mistakes whereas try to score maximum in your strong area.
• Give each and every mock as if it is your main CAT exam. Analyze them and write down both your mistakes and improvements.
• Take help from people if necessary, however, do not overwhelm yourself with advice. It will unnecessarily confuse you.

Don'ts

• Do not get disheartened by your low mock scores. Always keep your morale high.
• Do not compare yourself with others. Find your own strategy and work accordingly.
• Do not let a single bad section ruin your exam. Treat each section separately.

I will be joining IIM Calcutta this year. Overall the journey to IIM Calcutta wasn’t a cakewalk. It was full of ebbs and flows. However, looking back I believe the journey has made me more confident and strong enough to make my own decisions and believe in them. My most important advice for CAT 2020 aspirants is during your low moments, keep the morale high, and focus more on learning. Stay motivated throughout the journey and believe in yourself. And always remember

“ We learn from failures, not from success!”.

Good luck to Everyone!

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