My name is Rishabh
Yadav. I am 29 years old currently working as an Executive Engineer in the Central Public Works Department (CPWD), Ministry of Housing & Urban
Affairs, Govt. of India. I belong to the city of Azamgarh, Uttar Pradesh.
However, I have been brought up and did my schooling in the beautiful city of Dehradun,
Uttarakhand. Thanks to my father, Sh. Ram Bhuj Yadav was posted
as a teacher in Govt. School in Dehradun. Being the child of a teacher, you get
the privilege of being aware of the role of education and its importance in
one’s life and career since your childhood, so had I. So, here let me share my
experience as a student and appearing in various competitive examinations in the past several years and qualifying most of them with a good result.
As far as I
remember, I have been a sincere student since childhood. I did my entire
schooling from S.G.R.R. Public School in Race Course, Dehradun getting a
top rank in almost all the classes. But easier said than done, maintaining that
performance throughout all the classes was not that easy. I believe the prime
aim of a student should be to work as hard as he can to outperform everyone
else. I have passed 10th and 12th grades with 92.8 %
marks in both classes in CBSE boards in 2008 & 2010 respectively. I
appeared for the AIEEE exam in 2010 and got an All India Rank 5942 and 48th
rank in the state of Uttarakhand. Through this, I got into the National
Institute of Technology (NIT), Allahabad for pursuing B. tech in Civil
Engineering. The charm of getting into an NIT and the culture and lifestyle
of a hostel student affected me as well like most of the others. In my four
years of B. tech, I was an average student there.
I appeared for the GATE
(Graduate Aptitude Test for Engineering) exam in the final year of college
but as expected, I couldn’t achieve the desired result for getting me a good
job as I wanted. Most of my friends from the computer science field were placed
into good companies with handsome packages by the end of college. With no job
in hand, I moved to Delhi in 2014 like lakhs of other students to prepare for
the competitive examinations. With a lot of doubts and uncertainties in mind, I
started my preparation. It was really tough to come out of the comfort zone I
was in for the last four years in college. Difficult lifestyle in the small
rented room, food problems and above all the huge burden of studying and
performing well in the exams. However, I tried to keep myself composed and
motivated all the while and studied with full dedication and discipline.
I believe that ‘Discipline’
is the only key factor which will contribute to every student’s success.’
You should have a daily routine comprising of sufficient time to study and
revision along with some time for recreation. And most important thing than
making this routine is to adhere to it and follow it no matter what on daily
basis. It is tough only in the initial days, later it becomes a habit. So,
doing so I studied and prepared with full dedication and hard work for one year
and appeared for GATE in 2015 along with UPSC Engineering Services Examination
(ESE-2015).
As a result of my disciplined preparation, I qualified and got an All India Rank of 62 in GATE among almost 2.5 lakh students. Through GATE, I got interview calls from almost 10 PSUs (Public Sector Undertaking) companies and various IITs for pursuing M.Tech. I appeared in the interviews and got selected in the Grade-I post in various PSUs like Indian Oil Corp., ONGC, PGCIL, THDC, NBCC, RITES, HPCL & NHAI. I chose to join NHAI (National Highways Authority of India) at the post of Deputy Manager (Tech.). Meanwhile, I was also preparing for the interview for the UPSC-ESE exam as I had performed well in the written papers. As anticipated, I qualified in the written exams and was called to appear in the interview in front of the UPSC panel in November 2015. There were around 125 all-India seats in the year 2015 and corresponding to that around 400 candidates were called to appear in the interview from all over India. The total number of students who appeared in the written exams were around 4.5 lakhs in 2015. I appeared in the interview in the UPSC panel of Sh. Manbir Singh (Ex. IFS officer) on the first day of interviews itself. Though nervous but with good preparation, I was confident enough to perform well. Although the interview was lengthy and exhaustive, I managed to obtain a decent score. I continued in NHAI waiting for the results of UPSC-ESE. The results were declared in December 2015 and I managed to appear in the merit list with an All India Rank of 63.
Through
UPSC-ESE, I chose to get into Central Engineering Services i.e. into Central
Public Works Department (CPWD) under Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs
(MoHUA), Govt. of India in a Group-A Gazetted Post. After undergoing training for
8 months at National CPWD Academy in Ghaziabad, I got my first posting as Assistant
Executive Engineer in Delhi. After serving there for three years and
contributing into various infrastructure projects, I got promoted to the rank
of Executive Engineer and currently, I’m serving under Lucknow Zone at
Gorakhpur division.
After serving
for around 4.5 years at ground level, I feel that all those stressful and
uncertain days of preparation were really worth striving for. Sometimes, we get
very demotivated during our preparations and feel like quitting or choosing an
easier path which requires lesser inputs from our side but I believe that
easier paths will often lead you to an easier destination where a lot of others
like you will reach thus giving you lesser or no satisfaction. Difficult paths may
require a lot of effort from you but will also take you to some beautiful
destinations. With this, I would like to wish good luck to all the aspiring
candidates for various competitive exams. Keep striving till the goal is
reached. It’s not that far!!!
Thank You!!
Chandra Sawan | 21, Oct, 2021
"Nice Journey! Anyone can get inspiration and guidance."