Getting 90% on JEE – Too good?

I have taken JEE, GRE both subject and computer science advance, GMAT. Also I took CFA, CFP, and Society of Actuaries exams. Also took SAS exams.

What did I learn from all these. I will cover them gradually.

JEE was a beautiful exam, no doubt. I ranked about 250, raw score around 150. In contrast Narendra Karmarkar, Gurgar, Venky, and about 45 others in electrical who scored higher than I did. Many scored in a league in their own.

Karmarkar and others got around 90%. I got around 50%. What is going on?

A few years later I took GRE computer Science advance exam. There were 80 questions. 99% was 60. and I, got about 40, that got me 91%ile. That score was median score at Stanford PhD program, some of the pioneers in computer science that laid the foundation of computer revolution worth 100 trillions of dollars.

If somebody got 90 or 95%ile raw score people would have become either suspicious, or would have suspected once in a century genius.

In JEE I got 50% raw score and while I can accept a few slightly higher – say 52% raw or around, 90% raises suspicion. I was very smart, worked hard, and scored 50%. Where did the people who got 90% on JEE. Were they supernaturally bright?

Answer is that they cheated. If some smart boy is in 10th grade but some PhDs are allowed admission in the 10th grade too, smart boy will suffer while the PhD will get 90, 100 percent scores.

The reason is that unlike in the West where GRE decides where one should study, in India JEE is the the destination test. Pass the JEE with all unfair means, do PhD before, or go to Kota for 2 years. Why not make it 20 years? So that retired people can sit for JEE and crack it?

Once people clear JEE their lives are made. I didn’t study a thing in IIT, wasted my 5 years, but got admission to IIM-Bangalore and a job at Larsen and Toubro.

India is a country where tests are important. A person becomes IAS officer after 10 attempts and people applaud him.

JEE has become a joke. Instead of means to identify bright students, it find out people who prepared the most. All those coaching schools! Time and money spent. In my batch, were these 45 students electrical engineering better than I was? Based on my experience in America, I would say the actual number was close to zero. And no time was spent on me. No professor knew me. India is not producing scientists who can think.

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