CLAT 2018 Topper Interview: AIR 1, Aman Garg shares his success mantra

Aman Garg secured Rank 1 in CLAT 2018 by securing 159/200 marks in the national level law entrance exam. He attempted all the 200 questions in the exam and his section-wise scores in CLAT are: Mathematics – 11.25/20, English – 33.75/40, GK – 36.5/50, Logical Reasoning – 35/40 and Legal Aptitude – 42.5/50. He also gave AILET 2018 and secured AIR 17 in the exam with a score of 76.75.

A student of St. Anselm’s Pink City School Jaipur, Aman cleared his CBSE Class 12 exams with 93% from the Commerce stream. A fun-loving student, Aman shared that he cannot sit for more than two hours at a stretch to study. “So, I was very much into sports. I played all the sports be it Cricket, Football, Horse Riding and I also represented my school at district level”. Elaborating further he said, “When I was preparing for entrance exams at my Class 11 and Class 12 level it was never that I used to shut myself in a room and studied. I tried to be stress-free, I travelled over 15 countries. I am also a member of an NGO called Raksha which is an animal rights organisation and I used to go there as well. I love History and love visiting historical places”.

Aman Garg, CLAT AIR 1, spoke at lengths with Shiksha about his prep strategy, how he dealt with his strengths and weaknesses and also offered tips to aspirants. Go through the complete interview below for more details.

It was never a dream to get a particular rank in CLAT. What mattered to me was that I get admission into my dream college that is NLSIU Bangalore, which is the premier most law college in our country. So, rank did not matter to me but I knew I would be among the top 20 rank holders in the exam. But yes, getting AIR 1 in CLAT was a happy surprise to me and I am glad I got it.

My father is a RAS officer. He was posted out of Jaipur, where I live, for the last 4 years. So, my mother stayed back with me for all these years and she has sacrifice so much for me. So yes, when the result came out it was a very emotional moment. Everyone was calling and visiting us, there was lot of media also. It was an amazing moment of my life.

There is a huge misconception that if you have to crack not only CLAT but any entrance exam along with your school then you would not be able to perform well in both. But I think CLAT as well as Class 12 board exams are comparatively simple exams and can be easily balanced. In such a case the 11^th standard is of utmost importance. Because many people take it for granted but I feel it acts as a base for your 12^th Class and it is also the year where you do not have much pressure from school. So, you can prepare for your competitive exams in Class 11 and then just practice in your 12^th class.

Well, as per me CLAT is the most surprising exam because every year a different NLU organises it. Like this year it was conducted by NUALS Kochi. So, the CLAT pattern is never stable. It is always very different from the past year. So, it is never easy to compare two different CLAT examinations.

But as per me this year the paper was easy to moderate. If we go section-wise then English was pretty simple, the Reading Comprehension questions were direct, the vocabulary was of elementary level. So, English was easy to crack and a score of 30-31 marks was easy to get. Now coming to Maths, in CLAT Maths questions are till class 10 level. So, it is very basic and simple but this year was an exception and Maths was pretty tough. I have always been good at Maths but this year I found it difficult to solve many Maths questions. So, if a student secures between 8-10 then that would be good score.

I did my coaching from CLAT Prep Jaipur. I enrolled for the weekend batch. So, it was very manageable. Apart from my coaching I studied for topics like Static GK and Vocabulary on my own. Because in CLAT there is not much to learn as it is an aptitude test. But all that could be learnt I did in Class 11.

In my case too my computer shut down for 6-7 minutes. When the invigilators couldn’t rectify the issue they gave me a new computer. So, if you see even my case wasn’t that easy. I was in the middle of solving a question and in between it shut down and so I lost all my momentum. When you get such a gap in solving questions in an entrance exam then your heart beat increases and you tend to get nervous but the one who can keep his/her calm at such a situation at the end of the day would perform better. I saw people crying and shouting at the invigilators. They lost their calm and from there on their paper went haywire. So, it was really about keeping one’s mental balance.

But I think the people who are saying that they lost time. I mean people are scoring 50 marks and then they are saying that they lost 10 minutes of time and because of that they couldn’t score great marks, are just making an excuse or attributing their failure to another technical glitch. Yes, there were technical glitches but if we look back at the 2-3 years of CLAT examination then CLAT has always been in news for its technical glitches. This was not something new to CLAT this year. Also, at most of the places the students who got affected were compensated with extra time. Also, it was not like it happened to some particular people or at a particular centre. It happened everywhere.

Now when we see the paper, it was easy to moderate in terms of difficulty level. So, a person of mediocre level could have also solved the paper easily in 100 minutes. So I don’t think any candidate suffered a lot because of the technical glitches.

CLAT 2018 Topper Amang Garg with his family

As my exam went very well so for me it is a welcome decision. Even today also if there is an order for a re-exam, I am sure I will be able to crack that too. I am not saying I will get AIR 1 but I would have gotten a rank in the top 50. It doesn’t matter if students lost 10 minutes because the time was compensated and the Courts saw this point.

The people who are petitioning, they were not affected much because if you score 50 marks in 110 minutes and then you complain that your 10 minutes were lost and if the CLAT cutoffs are going around 135 then that is just making excuses.

So, I was happy with the Court’s decision and another reason for this was that I gave my CLAT exam simultaneously with my CBSE board exams where a re-test was ordered for Economics. So I had already gone through that mental trauma and so I did not want to sit for another re-examination.  

One thing is that students take their Class 11 very lightly but I took my 11^th class very seriously. I invested all of my free time in preparing for law entrance exams in Class 11. Other than that, people are content with doing current affairs preparation from one source only but I consulted around 6-7 sources.

Also, many students do not realise the importance of CLAT previous years’ question papers. Apart from that, it is very important to do as many mock tests as possible. I gave around 90-100 mock tests. Now, they too were online. So, when I used to give them at home then sometimes there was an electricity cut or someone used to come, so I used to lose my time there. In that way these mock test prepared me for the technical glitches which I faced at the time of the exam. Besides finding 200 new questions in every mock test, you strategise how much to attempt and which section to attempt first so all that helps a lot in exam prep.

Many students give a lot of mock tests but then do not touch them. I used to give mock tests and then analyse them, then and there itself, because it was only then that I was able to identify my weaknesses and strengths and thereafter worked on them.

My first preference is NLSIU Bangalore. Listing my NLU preference:

1. NLSIU Bangalore
2. NALSAR Hyderabad
3. WBNUJS Kolkata
4. NLU Jodhpur
5. NLIU Bhopal
6. GNLU Gandhinagar

Since NLU Delhi conducts its own entrance exam, thus, it is ranked 3^rd or 4^th among the NLUs in our country. However, if I had to choose between WBNUJS Kolkata and NLU Delhi then I would choose the latter.

Apart from CLAT and AILET, I also gave SLAT. It happened just one day before AILET. I gave SLAT only because I was appearing for law entrance exams alongside my 12^th Std and I wanted to get my exam nerves down. I got a good score in SLAT as well. My score in the exam was 122.

In terms of difficulty level, AILET was the most difficult followed by CLAT and then SLAT.

Do not take CLAT for granted. Many students feel that it is just an aptitude test and it is not JEE Mains. But every year the competition is rising humongously. Almost every second student in Commerce and Arts stream is attempting CLAT because law has lately become a very lucrative line.

Another advice that I would like to give aspirants who are in school right now is that start your CLAT prep as early as possible so as to gain an early bird advantage. It is possible to get good marks in Class 12 board as well as crack CLAT, so students should not even consider dropping a year for CLAT prep. They should simply start preparing at Class 11 level itself.  

Another tip is that keep your study sources, GK sources and handouts as diversified as you can. Do not just consult one source material as CLAT is a very unpredictable paper and questions can come from anywhere. Take as many mock tests as you can and from as many different institutes as you can because they too put in different questions. Then one should analyse all their mocks and work on their weaknesses, identify the topics from which you have continuously been making mistakes and just work on them.

Keep good company, as you know in CLAT 2018, AIR 2 Devansh and AIR 3 Anmol are my friends. We attended the same coaching centre. See what happens is that if you are in bad company they will demotivate you and say that this is not of much importance. But if you are in good company, you will have healthy competition, you will get good and new sources to study. So, be with people who motivate you. Be with people who build your confidence and people who believe in you.

Take regular breaks. Constantly mugging up things would not help you. You should pay adequate attention to your mental and physical well-being. So, take regular breaks, go for a movie or do anything that relaxes you. CLAT doesn’t require you to study for long hours, it just requires your focus, attention and evaluates you on how you can keep your calm and manage your time well.

I will be joining NLSIU Bangalore. In this NLU they follow the trimester system in which in one year there are three semesters. So it is quite hectic. I am planning to go there and adapt myself in the first year. And from second year onwards, I have squared it down to two options which will either be UPSC or I will go into Corporate sector.

Other related articles:

CLAT Topper Profiles 2018

CLAT Cutoffs