GATE 2023 Topper: Civil Engineering AIR 1 Suban Kumar Mishra left corporate job to prepare for entrance exam

GATE 2023 Result: Suban cleared the exam as a safe option as his ultimate goal is to qualify engineering services exam. He appeared in GATE 2020 and secured 2300 rank and in 2022 improved his rank to 801.

An IIT Kanpur alumnus, Suban got placed with Ola Cabs through campus placement in 2016. (Graphics by Angshuman Maity)

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Twenty-seven-year-old Suban Kumar Mishra secured an all India rank (AIR) 1 in the GATE 2023, the results of which were declared on Thursday. He quit his well-paid corporate job at Ola Cabs in 2020 to prepare for the Graduate Aptitude Test in Engineering (GATE).

An IIT Kanpur alumnus, Suban got placed with Ola Cabs through campus placement in 2016. “While I was graduating, I wanted to explore the corporate world and see if I could fit in. In my four years of work experience, I realised that no matter how high one gets paid there is no work-life balance. One can earn but there is no time to spend. Therefore, in 2020, I decided to quit my job and dedicate full-time to competitive exam preparation,” Suban said.

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Mishra cleared the exam as a safe option as his ultimate goal is to qualify Engineering Services Exam. He appeared in GATE 2020 and secured 2300 rank and in 2022 improved his rank to 801. However, he remained unsatisfied with his score and reappeared in 2023 to be in at least the first 50.

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“I appeared in the GATE to get a job in PSU as a backup. Meanwhile, I was also preparing for ESE. In 2021, I couldn’t crack the prelims while in 2022 I reached the interview stage. However, I couldn’t make it to the merit list. This year, I have qualified the prelims and will now appear in mains,” Mishra shared.

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Hailing from Rajasthan’s Alwar district, Mishra prepared for the exam through both online and offline coaching. “In 2020, I joined Unacademy to prepare online due to the pandemic. As the lockdown restrictions were lifted, I also joined offline classes. Regular study and practice of mock papers and previous papers helped in understanding the exam pattern and type of questions asked in the exam,” Suban said.

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