HAILING from a family of doctors, cracking the medical entrance exams seems like a natural career choice for Siddharth, who is currently studying at the All India Institute of Medical sciences (AIIMS) in New Delhi. He offers some good advice to aspiring medical students.

Siddharth Jain, Rank: Frist, Year: 2009

Apart from the AIPMT, he also gave the entrance test for AIIMS (ranked 3), the Delhi Pre-medical Test (DPMT - ranked 1) and Manipal Academy of Higher Education (MAHE - ranked 1).

Today, he is pursuing his MBBS at AIIMS. But according to Siddharth, though getting into medicine was a well-thought out decision, he has seen both the perks and the challenges of the profession and was also aware that admission to the profession was not a cakewalk.

A consistently good student, Siddharth scored 95.2 percent in Class 12. He attended Delhi Public School, Rohini, located a stone’s throw away from his house. Recounting his entrance exam preparation days, he says, “I would wake up in the morning and study Biology, and when I got bored I would solve Chemistry and Physics numericals.”

Note that Siddharth was an ace when it came to Physics, but struggled with Biology. But he studied harder in the subject during the last two months of preparation. “Students should capitalise on their strengths and work on weaker areas,” he says.

He joined the Narayana IIT Academy in Rohini in Class 11 as it has a good faculty and was located close to his house. He would learn what was taught in the institute the very same day. He stresses on being regular at school, too.

“Joining a coaching institute most importantly instils a competitive spirit in you, since there are also other students there aiming for the same,” he says. “There were many brilliant students around me who could not make it in the first attempt. I was determined to give my best,” he adds.

He, however, does not deny the fact that students do clear the exams sans any coaching. He stresses that they could enrol for the mock test series offered by a coaching class, if not a regular course. 

The AIPMT is conducted in two stages: Prelims and Finals, which are both three-hour exams. The Prelims is conducted in the first week of April and comprises 200 objective-type questions, 50 each in Physics, Chemistry, Botany and Zoology. A correct answer fetches 4 marks and a wrong answer, a negative marking of 1. Those who clear the Prelims, will give the final exam in May, which comprises 120 objective-type questions. While half the questions in the AIPMT prelims are from Biology, the AIIMS exam focuses more on Modern Physics and Human Physiology.

When quizzed about the future, Siddarth says he wants to conduct research alongside being a practicing doctor.