Aditi Krishnan, 18, loves to pursue multiple interests, even if examination is round the corner. From practising Carnatic music to Bharatnatyam dance and from exploring space technologies to writing, Krishnan balances her many pursuits with equal ease. A student of Vibgyor High Horamavu, Krishnan scored 92.2 per cent in her ISC exam and her aim is to pursue a PhD in astrophysics. “I think the turning point in my life has to be the series on OTT titled ‘Cosmos’, where I heard terms like dark energy, dark matter, etc. This is when I started exploring the space world and started looking for answers,” said Krishnan who studied PCMC (Physics, Chemistry, Mathematics and Computer Science) for ISC. “I am also looking forward to doing an internship at the Jawaharlal Nehru Planetarium in Bengaluru and exploring space technologies further,” added Krishnan.
This year, a total of 2,169 students from Karnataka appeared in the ISC examination, results of which were announced Sunday. Among the examinees, 1,005 (46.33 per cent) were boys and 1,164 (53.67 per cent) were girls. The overall pass percentage in Karnataka was 99.72 per cent, higher than the national average of 99.38 per cent. Karnataka girls have done better than boys with a pass percentage of 99.83 per cent, whereas boys achieved 99.60 per cent, the board said.
Sana Jose, who secured an AIR of 19, scored 99.5 per cent and emerged as the Karnataka topper.
A student of PCMC at St Joseph’s Boys High School, she believes consistency is what helped her achieve the feat. “I expected to score 97 per cent, but this was surprising. I think consistency is what helped me achieve this. I was consistent with the assignments and the class works that were assigned to me. Moreover, I am also preparing for JEE and I think this supplemented my training for the final examination,” said Jose.
“I attend my music classes in the morning and then go to school. After school, I attend my dance classes in the evening. I think music and dance have really helped me beat the stress of academics and life. I think it’s important to be efficient, despite dabbling in many interests. I ensure I follow a consistent routine and dedicate my time wisely in whatever I do,” said Krishnan who also writes blogs for NGOs. “I collaborate with my friends who are associated with many NGOs and I write on subjects like climate change, history of LGBTQ in India, Covid-19 crisis, etc,” added Krishnan.
Manas Neelesh Bam, who is a young entrepreneur, scored 99 per cent with a total score of 396. He built his first app when he was in Grade VII and has since then tapped the tech space and built solutions which have a social value and also an element of fun.
His latest app, Seekh, connects underprivileged students with teachers providing free tuition classes. “I realized the pandemic was very hard on us and it denied education to many. After seeing my domestic help’s daughter not being able to go to school, I realized I should build an app that connects underprivileged students with teachers,” said Bam. At present, his app lists 50 tutors from 15 regions. Overall, 90 students from across the country have benefited from the app.
Bam is pursuing a degree in Computer Science and a second major in business at Nanyang Technological University (NTU), Singapore. “I did not focus much on my Term-1 examination. However, the need to get into NTU which had a high cut off rate, made me focus a little extra. I usually spend one to two hours grasping the concepts of my subjects and I spend the rest of my time collaborating with my friends to develop apps for a social cause. However, ahead of the exam, I give my full attention to studying,” said Bam, who has developed apps and solutions like YOLO for Mask Detection, handwriter.in, sentiment analysis, Cube Attack, and drone detector, among others.
“I believe in tapping the tech space for a purpose, especially that has a social value and impacts the underprivileged ones. Pandemic has been the reason for it and helped me explore diverse aspects of machine learning and Artificial Intelligence. I love to figure out problems and see how I can add value by creating solutions…” said the 18-year-old boy.
Meanwhile, Hardik Jajodia, who scored 98.2 per cent in Commerce, from St Joseph’s Boys High School said: “As I love working on finance, I focussed on accounts and math a bit more and I solved over 20 sample question papers of accountancy ahead of my examination.”