BY A GT REPORTER
PANJIM: Goa's top-notchers it seems have elbowed out Medicine from its place of pride at the top of the career options' list and replaced it with Engineering.
Goa's brains are increasingly opting to compete for admissions to the country's 'E-schools', including the IITs, NITs and the big boys among institutes of technology.
A whopping number of 44 Goans cracked IIT-JEE examination this year. This is not all. Goans have also excelled in BITS-SAT and AIEEE (All India Engineering Entrance Exam). All these are All-India level examinations.
According to Vyankatesh Prabhudesai, himself an IITian who runs the Aryan Study Circle, a pioneers in IIT-JEE coaching here in Goa, the flexibility of the Engineering field is what's making it an option over medicine for Goan teens.
“Medicine is not flexible and hasn't many job prospects compared to engineering. In engineering, after B Tech you can directly opt for a job or go for a management course and get a managerial post in a company. As for medicine, after MBBS, one has to go in for MD, where there are few branches," stated Prabhudesai, who did a stint at the National Aeronautics Lab and also at NIO as a scientist for 12 years.
Speaking on the performance of Goan students on Monday, he said, 10 Goan students have excelled in BIT-SAT examination this year against last year's five.
“Of these 10, nine are from Aryan. The topper Darshan Variar scored 382 points out of 450 and Bhushan Borkar scored 354. All these 10 students scored more than 300 points and can apply either for BITS-Pilani, Goa or Hyderabad” Prabhudesai said.
Unlike other exams, it is online and also includes subjects like English and Logic along with PCM (Physics Chemistry Maths).
At AIEEE too Goans have fared well with 25 making the grade, 22 of them from Aryans.
“These students can apply at any of the 19 NITs (National Institute of Technology) and other institutes as there are 30,000 seats in India. Also, for this exam there’s a State quota and Goa has around 25-30 seats. Thus, we also have state ranks along with All India ranks,” Prabhudesai said.
Interestingly the IIT-JEE topper from Goa, Aneesh Tamse has also secured first rank in AIEEE from Goa. He has received 951st all-India rank at AIEEE and 998th all-India rank for the IIT-JEE.
“IIT-JEE is not just India's, but could be among the world's toughest exam," Prabhudesai averred.
He said, at Aryans the focus is more on IIT-JEE as other exams like GECT become much easier for the students.
Students are selected by an aptitude test and a personal interview by Prabhudesai. Around 300 students are being trained at their Margao and Panjim centres. They have three teachers and also invite guest faculty from the industry.
