Preparations

As I realized that I had to appear for JEE as well, I started gathering books for Physics, Chemistry, and Mathematics. Luckily, it wasn’t much of a hassle for me because I had a friend of my elder brother who had also opted for JEE and had all the study material. He gave me a math book that consisted of previous years’ questions (PYQs) of different entrance exams, chapter-wise. He also gave me a book of JEE Mains PYQs for physics. These books helped me understand the syllabus, the topics I needed to cover, and aided in my preparations.

Talking about Chemistry, I think NCERT Chemistry is sufficient for all these exams. However, to clarify your concepts, you may need to watch some lectures or get taught by a good chemistry teacher, otherwise, you may not be able to solve mains problems. Though I was getting coaching, it wasn’t from any renowned institutes like Allen or Aakash. So, to further clarify my concepts and solve good problems, I started watching lectures on YouTube, especially Alakh Pandey’s videos for both physics and chemistry. For math, I followed the book and Unacademy. It’s just my personal opinion, but Unacademy has a good faculty of math teachers. I still remember NV (Nishant Vora) Sir (an IIT Patna graduate). His way of teaching math is phenomenal and he made complex topics so easy. Even during my BTech journey, I sometimes look for his videos to clear some doubts.

Like most students, I was also unsure about these entrance exams. You will find it quite funny that it was during the middle of my 12th grade that I realized I had to take one of the toughest exams in India, the Joint Entrance Examination (JEE). The fact that I had to give JEE in addition to my board exams didn’t worry me much because I was already receiving coaching since 11th grade. This might not be the case for everyone, but I suggest those who have just passed 10th grade and opted for PCM (Physics, Chemistry, Mathematics) start focusing on JEE from the beginning. Keep in mind, JEE Mains is not that tough. Although I didn’t perform well and got a rank of 85k (general), I felt after giving the exam that if only I had studied a bit more, I could have done better.

JEE wasn’t the only entrance exam I took. Apart from JEE, I appeared for four other entrance exams at that time: WBJEE, CUSAT, COMEDK, and CUET. You must already know that the syllabus for JEE is based on 11th and 12th-grade topics. All these exams had common subjects: Physics, Chemistry, and Mathematics, along with other subjects like English, Aptitude, and Reasoning in CUET.