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TO-BE-FAMOUS FIVE: Nothing but the best shot could have taken them to the best business schools in the country. (From L to R) Amit Deshpande, Kaushik Mukherjee, Jatin Babani, S. R. Sreenivas and S. Suprat. — Photo: Mohd. Yousuf

The CAT's out of the bag and here are five 20-somethings who have belled it. Puja S. Navin catches up with Amit Deshpande, Kaushik Mukherjee, Jatin Babani, S.R Sreenivas and S.Suprat to find out how they tackled this tough competition which had 1,70,0000 aspirants competing for 1400 seats.

Why did you choose management as a career?

Kaushik Mukherjee (Electronics Engineer from BITS Pilani, currently working for a software company, who has made it to all six IIMs): I see this as a stepping stone to where I want to be in the future, start a company of my own.

Amit Deshpande (Electronics and Electrical Engineer from BITS, Pilani, also a software engineer who has cleared IIM-Bangalore): I want to move to IT consulting and IIM Bangalore is the best option for it.

Jatin Babani (B.Com (Hons) from Bharatiya Vidya Bhawan, Hyderabad, has got into IIM-Indore): IIMs are the ideal platform to get into an investment banking company and I wanted to study at the best B'School.

S.R Sreenivas (Electronics and Electrical Engineer from REC, Surat, also into a software company, got into IIM-Kolkotta, Lucknow, Indore and Kozhikode): What really drove me was the fact that for the past two and a half years, we have been seeing what not to do as a manager and it was time to learn what to do.

S. Suprat (Electronics and Communication Engineering from VJIT, 18 months work experience, with an admission offer from IIM-Kozhikode): I started preparing from September

When did you start preparing?

Jatin: I started preparations from 2004. This is my third attempt, but this year, I started when the SIM-CATS (Simulated CAT examinations started in September.)

Kaushik: I enrolled at IMS in March 2005, but self study started by June 1., from when I made it a point to balance work and study. I reached work early and left early and sat with my books.

Amit: This is exactly how I prepared too. In fact Kaushik and I prepared together.

Sreenivas: From September 2005.

Suprat: I took a break from work and prepared for four to five hours a day.

How many hours did you study?

Amit: First it was on weekends, then after July it was one and a half hours everyday.

Kaushik: It was three and a half hours everyday, not just sitting at the desk but applying my mind seriously. I used to take a mock test for two hours and then analyse it for 16 hours, over the next two to three days.

Sreenivas: In one of my mock CAT I got a very low score, that was when I got shocked and that's when I got serious.

How did you tackle your weak areas?

Jatin: English was my weak area, so I was reading newspapers and also during the paper I spent more time on English.

Kaushik: I tried experimenting. Instead of allocating 40 minutes per section, I kept 35 minutes and had a buffer of 15 minutes in the end. In Maths section, I spent the first three minutes, picking the questions I would solve, without getting unnerved that everyone around me was already solving the paper. This helped me maximize my strengths. But, this technique I developed after a lot of practice.

Sreenivas: I was good at verbal grammar, so I spent the first 10-15 minutes solving these questions, it was a warm up for me and then I was fully charged and went to Quantitative - and then I went to Data Interpretation and finally the last 15 minutes of Reading comprehension.

Suprat: Every week I would analyse each and every paper, taking every sum and see how many different ways you could approach it.

Sreenivas: Each one has to find their own style of working.

Kaushik: Which only comes with practice.

Amit: When you practice a lot of questions there is always something in every paper that you can note down.

Suprat: I always tried to solve each question analytically, it got me thinking analytically. CAT is not just another entrance exam, it is a test of your decision making skills.

Kaushik: One thing which we did was to take the test even when there were disturbances for example, once we took a test with a TV blaring, simply so that we could test ourselves even with noise.

Suprat: Just practice, any area where you are weak, put in additional practice. Let me give you an example, I was not good at geometry, I attempted 500 questions and moved up in my confidence levels.

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