Here’s the Interview of CAT Topper Karan Dutta, who scored 99.56%ile in the CAT exam and converted FMS with less than 60% in his graduation.
Q: Congratulations Karan on converting FMS with such a good score in CAT. Please tell us a bit about yourself.
KARAN: First of all thank you so much for having me here. I would like to start off from the very beginning. Right from my school days, I wanted to do something out of the box. So, first I went for JEE and got admission at BITS, Pilani. But, that was not enough for me because I wanted to do more than just being an engineer. I always wanted to set my limits high and that’s what always motivated me to do bigger things in life.
Q: Please tell us about your overall CAT score and also tell us about your sectional percentiles.
KARAN: I scored around 99.56%ile overall in the CAT exam. I scored 99.71% in VARC, 94.66%ile in DILR and 98.66%ile in the QA section.
Q: From how much time you were preparing for CAT and for an average person what is an ideal time required to prepare for the exam?
KARAN: I started my preparation at the starting of the year i.e from January itself right after my graduation had ended. Campus placement was not an option for me as I wanted to do something of my own. So, I contacted my network, discussed with them what I should do and what would be the best thing for me and that’s where a friend of mine suggested and encouraged me to go for MBA.
Talking about the time, initially as I was working for 10-12 hours a day, sometimes it would happen that I used to take things lightly. There were so many things that I had to take care of, so it was quite difficult for me in the beginning. But, for an average person I would say someone should start the preparation from the month of March or April and then take it forward through a structured strategy.
Q: According to you, what was the most difficult hurdle in your preparation journey?
KARAN: As I had started a business, there were a lot of new things, the marketing was quite difficult to do, as the pandemic had hit, So It was a challenge for me to take out some time for the preparation and maintain a proper schedule and balanced lifestyle. Some days I was able to put only 20 minutes in my preparation and that was really difficult.
Q: Talking about your preparation strategy, how did you tackle all the 3 sections during your preparation?
KARAN: Talking about the sections, I would talk about DILR, as I think that DILR is the breaking point for someone as the most tricky and toughest thing to do is to pick the right set of questions. Apart from that, there is no specific source for the preparation of DILR. So, it turns out to be a breaking point for most of the aspirants.
Watch Karan’s Full Interview Here :
Q: People often say that Engineers are better in the Quant section but on the other hand, You managed to get 99.71% in the VARC section. So, how did you do that?
KARAN: Talking about the VARC section, I was always good in english because I used to read a lot. But initially in the mocks, I was not scoring well in VARC and by seeing that I got demotivated. Then, I addressed this issue to Akash sir and he told me that CAT is something which is not an easy exam and is also unpredictable. And on the other hand, mocks are a part of preparation and one should not get demotivated as the scores do get improved with practice and hard work. So, I just focused on doing a lot of practice and then at the end the result was that I scored 99.71% in the VARC section.
Q: The aspirants of CAT come from different backgrounds and there are non engineers as well who struggle a lot in the Quant section. So, how did you prepare for the QA section?
KARAN: There were some practice series in the iQuanta coaching, like the RC 16 and QA 250. So, I took that series for practice and stuck to it till the end and what I found was that there were 3 questions of QA in the CAT exam that were exactly the same as what I saw in the QA 250 series. So, these series help you a lot and are really good for practicing QA.
Q: There are many students that reach 99.5% in CAT but there are very few like you that score 99.5 plus percentile. So, what would you like to say on this?
KARAN: For this I would like to say that it is not easy to study and prepare alone for the CAT exam. Sometimes you need to have some competition alongside you which can motivate you. In iQuanta, I used to see that most of my fellow aspirants used to be active every time even at the late night and were always up to post questions and ask for suggestions and motivations. So, this moved me a lot and gave me a fire that I have to beat them all and that’s what helped me to score 99.5 plus percentile.
Q: How did iQuanta help you in your preparation journey and were there any specific mentors or people who helped you specifically?
KARAN: There was one thing about iQuanta that really helps and it is that the groups always remain active and whenever I would feel disturbed or distracted I used to get the notifications where people used to post questions and put their doubts. So, this would get me motivated at that particular time only to start solving that question or doubt and get back to studies. Apart from that, there were two people who motivated me a lot and that was Akash Sir and my mother. Akash sir helped me a lot in tackling VARC and my mother was the one who was always there to look after me and motivate me to give my best.
Q: After clearing the CAT and getting a required score for your desired B-school, there comes the Interviews. So, what advice would you like to give for the interviews to all the other CAT aspirants?
KARAN: For the interviews I would say that you have to sell yourself in a way that the interviewers would get impressed by you. You have to showcase your domain of work and your profile in the best way possible and have to keep the interview going and that’s the key to clear the interview.
Q: One last question for you, what’s the 1 piece of advice that you would like to give to all the other CAT aspirants?
KARAN: The only advice that I would like to give to all the other aspirants is that CAT and MBA are not the only things that will set you in your life. There are many other things and for that you need to have a clear vision and a belief in yourself that no matter what happens, If you have set a target then you have to achieve it. If you want to do an MBA you should give your best on it and target your desired B-School and that is the only thing that is going to help you.
