Dubai student crowned ‘Outside India Topper’ in JEE exam

Students from the UAE have performed exceptionally well in India’s Joint Entrance Exam (JEE) Main, with Yatharth Samirkumar Shah, a Dubai resident, securing the position of ‘Outside India Topper’ with a 99.99 percentile mark.

Considered one of the toughest exams in the world, the JEE is a standardised test that gives its applicants the opportunity to get into some of the premiere educational institutions in India.

Yatharth Samirkumar Shah is now preparing for the JEE Advanced exam as he hopes to get into a college of his choice. “I want to study computer science at IIT Bombay,” he said. “I didn’t expect to get such a high score and be the outside India topper. I was expecting a good score but honestly, I hadn’t expected it to be this good. The result has exceeded my expectations.”

“Now I am focusing on preparing for the JEE Advanced. My first choice of college would be the IITs in India. If I am able to get a good rank, I would love to study at the college that I’ve been aiming for a long time,” added the IHS Oud Mehta student.

The JEE exams are conducted in two parts - JEE Mains and JEE Advanced. This year over 1.2 million students appeared for the NTA JEE Mains 2024 exam. The candidates' JEE Main 2024 ranks are determined based on their percentiles. Only the top 200,000 rank holders will qualify to appear for JEE Advanced 2024 or IIT JEE, paving their way towards prestigious engineering institutes.

Yartharth said, “I started preparing right after my Grade 10 board exams in June 2022. The first few months were difficult for me as there is a sudden change in the difficulty levels from one grade to another. The difference in syllabus was huge. Then juggling my time between school and my coaching centre at Allen Overseas was also a challenge. My school finished at 4pm after that I went for my JEE preparations to this centre.”

“Tuitions used to be from 5.30-8.30pm on two working days as well as on Sundays. The days I had both school and coaching I could barely find anytime. On weekdays I would put in three to four hours of work and on the weekend I would put in 10-12 hours of work,” he added.

Yatharth said the pandemic had also posed substantial impediments.

“The initial part of Grade 11 posed considerable challenges due to the postponement of our Class 10 board exams, leaving us with a two-month deficit to cover the Grade 11 syllabus. This time constraint made it tough to stay on track with the curriculum and grasp all the concepts thoroughly.”

Despite the limited time, he persevered relentlessly to accomplish his goal. “During the two-week break between Grade 11 and 12, I dedicated myself to revising all the concepts, receiving valuable assistance from my teachers at Allen Overseas. As soon as school concluded, I spent the entire day at the institute, either studying independently or seeking clarification from my teachers.”

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