MBBS is not his cup of tea for state's NEET topper

The student who secured the first rank in Karnataka Common Entrance Test (CET) for engineering has figured in the list of rank holders for the National Eligibility and Entrance Test (NEET).

Shridhar Doddamani of Vijayapura has secured 105th rank in the NEET, the results of which was announced by the Central Board of Secondary Education on Monday.

Doddamani said his preparation was not aimed at getting a high rank in NEET. “I did not aspire to study medicine. I have scored a higher rank than I anticipated. It is only to gain experience that I wrote the exam.” He prepared with focus on Physics and Chemistry and, had he studied Biology with the same amount of effort, he would have got a higher score, he added.

This rank holder hopes to get a seat at NIIT-Surathkal for Computer Science. He hopes to pursue research in the field of Physics at the Indian Institute of Science later. Doddamani said that learning concepts well and not just studying for marks helped him excell.

While Akshatha Kamath Ammembal, a student of Expert PU College Mangaluru has secured 107th rank in NEET, Mahima Krishna, a student from Bengaluru has secured 209th rank. This student from VVS Sardar Patel PU College had secured the third rank in CET for BSc Agriculture Sciences.

“It is my childhood dream to study medicine and I worked towards it. There are none (doctors) in my family,” said this topper who took coaching from BASE. She said that keeping calm during exams helped her perform better.

Other top rankers from the state are: Medha Sharath, Deeksha PU College (213), Vikram Ram Rajagopalan, Deeksha PU College (336), Vishal Rao, VVS Sardar Patel PU College (346), Vineet Magur, Shaheen PU College, Bidar (342) and Ranjan BS, Deeksha PU College (450).

No top ranks

Not a single student’s name from Karnataka figures in the top 50 ranks. “The cut off for the NEET is quite low (119), probably because of a few errors in the Chemistry, which might have led to confusion and loss of time for the students. As problems were relatively tough, this might also have contributed for the lower cut off,” said Y K Jayaramappa, CEO, BASE.