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Pune girl second ISC topper in country
Ritisha Gupta was happy to make a dent on the stereotype attached to the division of subjects.
Pune: City girl Ritisha Gupta of the Bishop’s School in Camp, has stood second in the country for the Indian School Certificate (ISC) Class 12 exam.
The results of Indian Certificate of Secondary Education (ICSE) Class 10 and Class 12 exams conducted by the Council for Indian School Certificate Examinations (CISCE) were declared on Monday afternoon.
Gupta secured 99.25 per cent, with full marks (100) in history, political science and sociology, and 97 in English and 96 in economics.
The 17-year-old was happy to make a dent in the stereotype attached to the division of subjects. “The stream-based discrimination that society does is wrong. No subject or stream is less difficult or less important than the other. At the end of the day, it boils down to what you like to study and not what others would like you to study. Only then can you succeed,” said Gupta.
She said that many think that high scorers are always from the Science stream as they are assumed to be intelligent students and those who opt for Commerce or Humanities belong to a lower-merit category.
“I love history and want to later specialise in it, and so I chose the stream. My liking for the subjects helped me score good marks,” she said.
Aspiring to do a bachelor’s in History from Delhi University, Gupta said, “History is the blueprint of time, a study of which not only tells you the stories of the past, but also what could possibly happen in the future. It’s extremely complicated and interesting that’s why I am so fascinated by it.”
A voracious reader, Gupta loves to read fiction and non-fiction. During the two years of preparation for the exams, she read many books, including John Green’s Turtles All The Way Down and Ken Follett’s Fall of Giants.
“Although a cliché, the seven hours of school can be of huge help to students. Half of my preparation was done only by paying attention in the class, and the rest is hard work,” she said.
The topper said that students should pick the stream that they love and then do their best to study it for the love of knowing about it, and not marks. “You will automatically start doing well just for the love of it, and the marks will then follow,” she said.
