Date and session of interview-6th April, Afternoon
Board-TCA Anant Sir
Optional-Psychology
College-IIT Roorkee
Profession (if any)- Nope
Hobbies- didnt write any.
Chairman: (very friendly and smiling)
Q1) What have you been doing since graduation?
Q2) What was your project that won competition? (DAF)
Q3) What is CERN? What work do they do there? (DAF)
Q4) What did you observe at CERN? (DAF)
Q5) Compare research at CERN with that at IIT Roorkee. (DAF)
Member Questions: (all were smiling, patient listeners)
Q) What FTA India has signed this year?
Q) Why bilateral FTA instead of WTO agreements?
Q) What is benefit of FTA? How it will benefit service sector?
Q) What motivated you to civil services instead of research?
Q) How Technology is leading to unemployment?
Q) Historical significance of Meerut. Lady member totally focussed on Meerut and asked many follow ups. (DAF)
Q) Benefits of PPP model?
Q) And cons of PPP?
Q) If there is a tract of forest land and a road has to be built cutting the trees to connect two places. Environmental activists are protesting against the project. What will you prioritise as DM - environment conservation or Development?
Q) If on a highway with speed limit of 40kmph, you find an injured person and have to quickly take him to hospital. What will you do?
.. many follow ups were asked that I am not able to recall.
Your experience in interview-
Board was very cordial. Members were trying to nod at everything I said to encourage me. Felt good to have conversation with such an esteemed panel. Wish I was better prepared.
Utility of mocks (if any)-
I gave 4 mocks (2 offline, 2 online). I think they were very useful for building counter questions from DAF. Also to build confidence if you havent spoken much before in formal places. I would give more if I had time. But accept their advice only if you agree with it, not blindly. I was getting high marks in mock interview (195 at IasBaBa, 198 at NextIAS) because they were knowledge based. But in real interview questions were more personal and DAF based, in some counter questions I struggled.