JEE Advanced Results: 18-year-old from Mumbai gets AIR 7, is Maha topper

Eighteen-year-old Kartik Nair emerged Maharashtra topper with an All-India Rank (AIR) of 7 in the Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) Advanced results 2021 that were announced by the National Testing Agency on Friday. Neeraja Patil, 17, from Mumbai stood first among girl candidates in the state with an AIR of 266.

Eighteen-year-old Kartik Nair emerged Maharashtra topper with an All-India Rank (AIR) of 7 in the Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) Advanced results 2021 that were announced by the National Testing Agency on Friday. Neeraja Patil, 17, from Mumbai stood first among girl candidates in the state with an AIR of 266.

Eighteen-year-old Kartik Nair emerged Maharashtra topper with an All-India Rank (AIR) of 7 in the Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) Advanced results 2021 that were announced by the National Testing Agency on Friday. Neeraja Patil, 17, from Mumbai stood first among girl candidates in the state with an AIR of 266.

Both Nair, student of Kandivali-based Ryan International School (CBSE board) and Patil, student of Dixit Road Junior College of Science at Vile Parle, plan to pursue computer science at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Bombay. A total of 141,699 candidates appeared in both papers 1 and 2 this year, of which around 41,862 candidates have qualified.

This year, the eligibility and admission guidelines were tweaked owing to the pandemic. As against an aspirant having to score 75% or more in Class 12 board exams to be eligible for JEE-Adv, the criterion was tweaked, considering all school education boards in the country scrapped Class 12 exams this year.

Candidates should have cleared their class 12 exams and should be among the top 2.5 lakh successful candidates including all categories in JEE-Mains 2021. The number of spare seats in various programs will be decided by individual IITs ensuring that every institute has at least 20% female enrollment in undergraduate programmes.

Nair aspires to pursue research in artificial intelligence. He likes listening to music and playing football. He has been preparing for JEE for the past two years. “I enjoy studying, constantly solving assignments and focusing on a lot of practice. I studied only during the day and at night would focus on sleep and relaxing my mind and body. The most important thing was to eat healthy and use gadgets only for academics. Sometimes I would watch informative videos on music and football,” said Nair, who resides in Kandivli. Nair, whose father is an IT consultant and mother a computer science professor, is the only child.

Similarly, Santacruz resident Patil has always been academically inclined. She started training for JEE from Class 9 onwards. Last year, she received a rank of 400 in JEE mains. “It has been a great leap for me in terms of my overall rank. I strictly followed my study timetable and ensured that I practised to the core. Every morning I indulged in yoga which calmed my mind,” added Patil, whose father works for Tata Power (Solar) and mother is employed with Mahagenco.

“The online classes this year did not deter my spirit. To be away from excess screen time, I focused on playing chess with my twin sister. I would also play the keyboards in my free time. My parents always motivated me and ensured that I took care of my diet and sleep patterns,” said Patil, whose twin sister is pursuing medicine and both of them often discuss common subjects like chemistry and physics.