JEE (Mains): Students find paper 1 lengthy in Jaipur, easy in Patna

Applicants found chemistry and physics portion of the exam tougher than mathematics.

A number of students found paper 1 (BE/BTech) of Joint Entrance Exam (JEE) Mains lengthy in Jaipur on Sunday, while in Patna many applicants said that the paper was easy.

Students going inside exam center to take JEE (Mains) in Lucknow on Sunday.(Deepak Gupta/ HT photo)

In Jaipur, students were dissatisfied with the time limit for paper I. They found chemistry and physics portion of the exam tougher than mathematics. A total of 90 questions, carrying 360 marks, had to be answered in three hours.

“I found chemistry portion toughest and could attempt only 60 out of 90 questions. Mathematics questions were of average difficulty but physics and chemistry papers were tough. Overall, the paper was lengthy”, said Abhishek, who took the exam.

“The question paper was very lengthy and I attempted only 75 out of 90 questions. However, my preparation was good and I am confident of getting a decent score”, said another applicant Mridul Jain.

A total of 44,253 candidates appeared for paper I held across 72 centers in Jaipur. They were frisked at the venue as carrying any stationery, mobile phones and electronic gadgets was prohibited.

In Bihar, around 54,000 students appeared from different parts of the state at around 29 centres in Patna, 10 in Muzaffarpur and eight in Gaya. Students who took Paper-1 termed the overall paper easy with chemistry being most scoring.

“It was perhaps the easiest paper of JEE (Mains) in last three years. Mathematics was relatively easy while chemistry was quite scoring. Only physics was tough among the three subjects, like always,” said Rajat Kumar and Manish Kumar, who took the examination.

JEE paper-1 aspirants had started lining up at the examination hall since 7am in the morning, as per CBSE guidelines. The CBSE has taken strict measures to prevent use of unfair means.

While most examinees cooperated to the frisking and security measures at the centres, tension was reported from a few centres in Bihar, where parents of the appearing students and security personnel had a tiff. No violence was reported.

Parents of the examinees waited outside the examination hall in the scorching heat till 12.30pm, the conclusion of paper 1.

In Lucknow, many candidates reached examination centre hours before the start of the paper as they knew that frisking will be done.

Thousands of students took the exam in Lucknow too, but we do not have their reaction till now.

Ahead of the start of exam, City Montessori School student Gaurav told HT that he had prepared well for examination.

“Alongside boards I prepared for the competitive examination. But honestly speaking, this exam is going to be tough. I will also appear in state entrance exam to be conducted by AKTU previously known as UP Technical University,” said Gaurav.

Sunday’s exam was a pen-and-paper test with the online test being scheduled to take place on April 8 and 9.

JEE (Main) is being conducted by the Central Board of Secondary Education at Centres in 129 cities in India and abroad. More than 12.07 lakh aspiring engineers are likely to sit for the prestigious exam this year.

The three-hour long test has questions from Physics, Chemistry and Mathematics - all of which have equal weightage.

Based on the performance in JEE (Main), the top 1.5 lakh aspirants will be selected to take the JEE (Advanced) for admission to the Indian Institutes of Technologies (IITs).

(With inputs from Lucknow Correspondent)