Oh My IIM
It was June 2020. I had finished my graduation from NIT Trichy, was all set to start my first job. The pandemic was causing stress, so I was not focusing on anything else than my upcoming job role. Suddenly, HR called me and said that your joining has been postponed to a later date in 2021, the details will be communicated around year-end. The moment felt numb, I had been seeing a lot of posts on LinkedIn about people losing their jobs and I had thought I will be the next of them. Here came the deciding moment. I knew that I always wanted to do an MBA, but I was also aware of the ongoing situation around that time and thought applying for a new job will not be a bad idea as well. So confused, that I came at the last resort — ‘A Coin Toss’. Well, you all can guess what the outcome was. CAT 2020 was the winner of that toss. And that is how it all started.
I started looking for online materials, test series recommendation and some peers appearing for the same. Luckily, I found all of them. The friends, the journey, and the mocks. It was no less than a roller coaster ride. I was struggling with VARC a lot, but my friends had my back. I give special credit to Minkesh Devani, Mayank Bhuva and Simran for all their help. And then I crossed paths with Shubham Ranka, from Prepzone. I remember the first chat I had with him, he had shared a link with me to post my mock scores there and had also offered help with VARC. I texted him, talked to him and the way he had understood what exactly was going wrong with me, shocked me. I followed the tips, still, the improvement was not very significant. Then, I enrolled for VARC 1000 by Gejo and Prepzone VARC Booster course. These two courses gave a much-needed boost to my VARC scores. The tricks of Gejo and the healthy competition of prepzone gave me a good consistency in my performance and the much-needed confidence. My VARC was finally on track and I was on cloud 9. And then came the D-Day.
29 November, Slot 3. As soon as I entered the exam hall, I was ready with the strategy and what not. It was the moment to utilize all the practice and preparation I had done for CAT. The VARC section did not give me any headaches, everything was going as planned, Thanks to Shubham Ranka, Gejo and Ayush Daruka (A friend and a mentor). But all this changed in the LRDI section. The type of questions was of a complete surprise to me. I had not talked to any other slot people of that day, so I was not having any clue and mental preparedness for the same. Somehow, I picked an easy-to-read set, 10 mins gone and not a single question solved. I panicked. I left that set half solved and none attempted, went ahead for others. That hurry caused me to overlook some of my calculation mistakes, but anyhow I ended up attending 3 sets. 20 secs remaining in the LRDI section, and I was so disheartened as I almost believed that my work was gone to dust. Anyways, QA was always my forte and I decided to give my best at it. Albeit the stress did not allow me to do that, yet I attempted a decent number of questions. With a sad face, I exited the room, and after 5 minutes, I was flooded with messages and calls about the paper discussion and that did not improve my state any better.
Desperately contacting my HR for job updates, and at the same time waiting for the CAT results, was one of the worst times I had till date. And finally, the results came. I had scored decent in VARC and QA (36 and 59) but LRDI was just 22. After discussing with mentors, I realized that I might just clear the cutoffs for my dream B schools, the Holy Trinity of ABC, and that happened. January 2021, CAT results came, and I was back in the game with a 99.6%le score and my all sectionals were above 90+% (96.77/94/99.82). Hereon, I was prepared for the second phase, cracking the interviews. And chasing the dream of ABC.
Shubham Ranka and the team had gained my trust, I enrolled for the GDPI course, along with a local TIME Jaipur centre enrollment for the same. And this journey was entirely different from the CAT one. I had calls from IIM A, B, C, L, K, I, FMS. This gave me some confidence and drive to push myself. But mostly, it was the people who had helped me constantly and became close in a very short period. The Journey ended on a good note, I had converted IIM B, C, L, K, I, FMS.
(Yes, A rejected me :/, but lite B>A and C>(A+B)).
The people who made this possible for me are —
1. Venkat Krishna (Made in China AI but a cool friend)
2. Vikas Singh (A good guide and a great friend. Although Overaged a bit: p)
3. Aniruddha (Cannot thank you enough man. Thanks for everything)
4. Amit Gunjeti (Founder of AV club, he is good at taking mock PIs)
5. Vaibhav Yadav (HSBC, OP, EoD!)
6. Mihir (Partner in RR, Upcoming IIM A)
7. Shivam (Lol Bruh)
8. Shubham Aggarwal (IIM A, and Poor Jokes)
9. Aditya Mittal (A good human and dost)
10. Arjun Radhakrishnan (Like an elder brother, IIM B upcoming)
The list is long. Kishan, Aditi Bagra, Amit Jaiswal, Tarique, Pranav, Utkarsh, Sai, Saksham, Aaditya Pagar, Supriya, Rashika, Preksha, Sanjana, Anushika, Praveen, Rupesh, Akhil, Aayusha, Kamal, Harshavardhan, Kashyap, Kruti, Pragya and many more. Thanks a lot for everything. Without the support you all gave, nothing of this could have been possible.
And a big big big thanks to Rajat Sir, Nishant Sir/Bhaiya, Yash Sir, Shubham Sir, Prashant Sir and all prepzone team.
And those who are still not sure where am I joining? Well, even I am yet to find out. But looks like it will be B, maybe. Or more than maybe.
Thanks for reading 😊
Himanshu Bareth | Upcoming IIM B (2021–23)
CAT 20–99.60%
