7/27/2019 Suvro GD Pi Questionnaire

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IIM CALCUTA GD/PI EXPERIENCE QUESTIONNAIRE 

PERSONAL DETAILS:  

Name: Suvro Sarkar 

Education: B.Tech (Hons.)

Manufacturing Science & EngineeringIIT Kharagpur 

Year of passing out: May 2005

CGPA: 8.24

WORK EXPERIENCE: Nil

CAT PERCENTILES:

Overall: 99.85

Verbal: 98.58Quantitative: 99.27

DI/Reasoning: 99.22

GD/PI Calls: B, L, A, C, K, IFinal calls: C, L

GD/PI venue: IIM Calcutta

GROUP DISCUSSION:

Topic of the GD: “Should Governors of States be nominated by politicians?”.

No. of participants in the GD: 9Time Limit and any other instructions: 2 minutes to collect your thoughts, 15 minutes of speaking time.

Whether asked to summarize the GD: At the end, open offer given to summarize to anyone who thought

he hadn’t contributed much to the GDWhether a written summary of the GD was asked: No.

THE GD EXPERIENCE: (please provide at least 5 lines of description)The topic was relevant in the context of the removal of the Goa Governor and other such recent incidents.

So everyone had a fair knowledge from the newspapers as to the content of the GD. However, thediscussion strayed to the Indian constitution and whether it can be amended and how it can be amended.

 No clear solution to the politicization of the Governor post was offered at the end. At the end, when avoluntary summary was asked for, no one took the lead since it meant accepting that the person’s previous

contribution to the GD had not been meaningful enough.

 How would you rate the Chaos level in the GD (on a scale of 1-10, 1 being most peaceful 10 being most 

chaotic): 5/10

7/27/2019 Suvro GD Pi Questionnaire

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 Any observations on mistakes you committed in the GD: I did not put across my points in the GD

forcefully across. Even though I had a few good points to make, I could not direct the group’s attention tothose points and they largely remained unheard. This fact was brought to my notice at the time of the

interview by the panelists. So make sure you break in at the right point and be loud and clear about the

 point you are trying to make.

 Any observations of what you could have done better in the GD: Avoided the mistake pointed out above.

When asked to summarize voluntarily, should have had the courage to do so.

 Any tips for GD preparation: No need to mug up the latest figures of the Indian economy or any such

thing. Just throwing pure facts will not help unless you justify why you are putting across facts and

figures. Be well read on current political and economic affairs though, for which the recent newspapersand magazines should be enough.

PERSONAL INTERVIEW:

No of interviewers in the Panel: 2 (two professors, the alumni was absent)

List of the questions asked and your responses: 

(Intro questions/acad based questions/work experience based/general awareness/personal questions)

The introductory question was about my performance in my GD and how I thought I had performed in it.They then pointed out what were the mistakes I had committed.

After that I was asked some questions on fairly arbitrary and unconnected topics. One of the questions wasabout the escalation in oil prices and why I thought the prices were rising. When I linked it to issues in the

Gulf Region and the US war, I was asked two questions: One was my rating of President George Bush Jr.

and why I would rate him thus and the second question was about the Gulf War in 1991 and what exactlyhad happened at that time. To the 2nd question I had no clue and I tried to make some silly joke about it

happening at a time when I was just a kid, which sort of backfired as they asked me whether I should not

know about history which happened before I was born.

I was then asked to show my graduation marksheet and they wanted to see if I had done any electives

outside my engineering discipline in eco/other mgmt areas. I had done courses on OR and Fin Man and

Quality Assurance, so I was asked some basic stuff about OR. No other technical questions as such.

The interview ended with some personal questions on my hobbies including what books I like to read and

what is the last book I have read and what is the last book by an Indian author I have read. (If you want toknow the answers, they were respectively 1984 by George Orwell and English, August by Upamanyu

Chatterjee). That was all I guess.

 Any observations on mistakes you committed in the PI: Tried to conjure up inopportune jokes. Didn’tknow much about the oil prices rises but still tried to go deep into the matter and didn’t come away too

well with it. Couldn’t remember the name of the author of English, August. Criminal Offence!

 Any tips for Personal Interview preparation: Concentrate on a few of your graduation subjects in which

you can be confident enough to mention as your favourite subject. If you have done some mgmt courses as

well, eg economics, try to recapitulate some basic fundae like demand elasticity and the like. And again,try and be aware of current world affairs. Also, be well prepared about all your hobbies. Be prepared to be

taken to the depths in the areas of your interests as mentioned in the form. And finally, practice the art of 

displaying your ignorance on a subject in a manner which is the most befitting.