IIT JEE Do not put all eggs into just this basket

A little bit of Chennai JEE preparation trivia for you guys. Back in the late 90's, when FIITJEE and others were not all-prevalent, back when Kota was just another town in Rajasthan, back when I was in school, we had a professor named Balasubramanian who used to teach Physics. He used to be part of a group where Mr. Balu and Mr. Ananthan taught Physics, Mr. Santhanam and Mr. Govindarajan taught Chemistry and Mr. T.R. Subramaniam taught Maths. They used to teach the subject for Rs.800 for a year in the first year and Rs. 1000 per year for the second year. Think about that. People probably have dinners for that amount now.

Anyways, although all 3 subjects are important and all that, the person who ruled the entire show was Mr. Balu, who, unfortunately for Chennai students passed away in 98-99. He was an extraordinary teacher. But more than than, he was very strict as well and clearly induced terror in his students (He halted the class for 20 minutes to have a go at me once, but that is a blog post for later). What stood out in his entire plan for JEE preparation was his absolute conviction that anyone preparing for the JEE needed to have a plan B.

At the end of standard XI, all of us would have counseling at his place, a ritual whose key participants were Balu, a quivering student who is not all that sure about himself and is scared that Balu is going to mention the paper where he scored 4 out of 50 (back then this might have been a decent score) and a parent of the student who is absolutely sure that his son/daughter would improve. Balu would start the chat by reciting the scores, admonishing the student about his poor scores and telling the father - "Saar, let your son not waste his time going for this dream called IIT. It is best that he shifts now to something appropriate." He actively discouraged students who were borderline IIT candidates from going for it. Prof Balu was indeed the consummate marketing guru.

The professor’s funda was straightforward. The JEE is a hit-or-miss exam for anyone. These 16-year olds have IIT dreams and think it is a cake walk. A lot of them might not make it, and it is better for them if they actively prepared for their plan Bs. I think there is a lesson in this. I also hold the view that anyone preparing for the JEE should have a plan B also.

JEE is unpredictable. Don’t put all your eggs in this basket. Make sure you have other options.

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