Dear Roopsee,

• Interview Marks: 200!! very high weightage given to interview. - What they are looking for? PCM?GK? Eng? I guess they are looking for a person with really good characteristics! Your personality and that's what it is - personality test!
• Remember you should have properly gone through the syllabus before the interview and must have selected 2/3 topics from each subject as your fav topic.
• Are you afraid of this world? If NO, then dont be afraid of even those 5-6 people sitting in the room and taking your interview! Face them with a calm and composed mind. Be cool and active! You are facing interview becuase you deserve that!! You have some outstanding credentials!!

Before taking seat you should wish all board members a "Good Morning or a Good afternoon” in a pleasant manner. They will ask you to take the seat.

Always remember, your first answer determine the direction of your interview, i.e. ABOUT YOURSELF. It is easiest to answer because you can know yourself best. So, mould the things in your way!!

Besides questions from PCM they can various questions as mentioned below.

Q : Tell us something about yourself -

• Ideally the introduction should be of 1 min - 2 min maximum.
• Includes schooling, background (if you feel it is important), city, strengths (think about your strength - honesty is not a strength in the professional world) interests, and presently what you are doing (for example some students are already in NIT, DCE, IIIT etc).Do not mention your age.
• When you say strength - they can ask your weakness also. Ideally every person has some weakness but still we praise people for its good things and not weakness. Still if weakness have to be mentioned, select the weakness which doesn't comes strongly in your professional way. The best way of defining weakness is the one which gets originated from your strengths. For example if you are hard work then lot of hard working is describe as workaholic. Similarly, when you say you are very committed, it means sometimes you are motivated in a single direction with your full potential. If your strength is patience listening, then sometimes you spend lot of time in listening and trying to understand others. When you say I am practical then weak point can be that sometimes you are very strict to everyone.
• Strength: If you plays tennis then " I'm a person of determination as I'm a Tennis player, which also gives me an attribute of goal orientation."
• Ideally your negative traits should come from your positive traits
• (+ve)Goal oriented - (-ve) to accomplish your goal, at times to tend to give less time to your family and friends.
• (+ve)Optimistic - (-ve) you try to find a silver lining in every dark cloud, which at times ruins the objective.
• (+ve)Creative - (-ve) Thinking and imagining, at times you tend to go too much beyond factualness.
• (+ve)Benevolent - (-ve) At times, people take unusual advantage of your "such nature."
• Cite certain negative aspect of yours, which actually gives a positive tint. E.g. Lack of patience, work holism etc.
• You should never say that you are short tempered or lazy etc. These are superlatives of negative attributes.
• Our strength grows out of our weaknesses!

Q 2: For those students- Who are already in some good engineering college -

• Why you want to leave NIT for SCRA? It will leave one more seat vacant and a loss to other student as well - The answer should be very simple like I am very much interested in joining SCRA, and you joined NIT as SCRA is one of the most competitive exam and joining NIT was a good option at that time (career planning). Or whatever you feel you can defend.
• Answers like - my parents ask me to do so! should be avoided

Q 3: Next question can be from your hobbies -

• If your hobby is computing then you should be well aware how languages are classified, details about the basic part of the computers, about the various well known companies etc.
• If your hobbies is singing or music then you should have some knowledge of music.
• If your hobby is painting then you should know about various types of paintings.
• If you don’t know about your hobbies then now it is not the right time to go through all the books thoroughly, just get the basic details.

Q 4: You should be well aware of the current affairs. For example inflation. recession. How Indian railways can help in decreasing inflation? By reducing freight charges, but to a self sustained model.

Q 5: What do you think about the future of railways in India? - Indeed lot to be done. Most of the railways tracks etc need to be updated, upgradation to new technologies.

Q 6: In recent past there have been few accidents in Delhi Metro - What you think the cause of such accidents? - You should not go into the technical details and get stick to the official stand i.e. the authorities were trying to implement the projects in the best manner and such type of incidents during construction is not an exception, though measures should be taken to avoid them.

Q 7: Tell us about your city - You should know at least 5 things about your city. In case if it is a city like Cochin, Hyderabad or Lucknow, then indeed lot of things to be known.

Q 8: As a mechanical engineer in railways, how railways would be benefitted?

Q 9: Which job you will prefer? MNC or SCRA; SCRA or IAS?

Q 10: Which game you play? Technical question based on those - Cricket invites lot of questions and also cricket is not welcome compared to other games - Personal view of Aryan Classes

Q 11: By which train you have come to Delhi?

• Train Number? Stops during the train? Bogey number? Tkt No? PNR No? Berth No? Fare? etc - No need to remember such details except train no, stops (majors) fare and coach. They can ask anything specific written on the coach etc. But it is not the matter of concern. Remember they can ask you anything, you answer what you can. In all case you should act in a cool manner and as per your senses.

Q 12: If you are the authority in Railways, which two measures you will take for sustainable upgradation of the Indian railways, considering all people? -

Q 13: Who is your favourite railway minister till now? and Why?

• Your answer should be based on facts. Lalu was invited by various schools for guest lectures but Miss Mamta Banerjee says Railways does not have enough fund as stated by Lalu ji (use Mr. Lalu Prasad Yadav or Shri lalu Prasad Yadav and not Lalu ji!). Mr Lalu Prasad Yadav started lot of railway schemes and certainly railways had a good time during Lalu. You can also compare Nitish Kumar if you have any data.
• Question is papers are still remain the same but what actually happened according to which as per Laluji, Railways have enough fund, and as per Mamta Banerjee, they hardly have any fund? This is indeed a tough question and facts are not there in public. Answer should be based on common sense. You can say that most probably Mr. Lalu Prasad Yadav was planning various projects considering the potential of the Indian Railways and various revenues which will come along with various projects in the future, while Miss Mamta Banerjee is considering what is their in the cash. I personally feel it is just the way the various propspects of various projects have been analysed by two different railway ministers.

Q 14: Any suggestions to stop frequent rail accidents? - Remember hardly any suggestion would be very new and innovative! They also don’t expect you to be innovative in that sense! The only answer is reducing human error and using new technologies and improving infrastructure (staff, phones etc).

Q 15: Which is your favourite subject?

Q 16: Apart from being good in academics, in what other activities you participate in your school?

Q 17: For students studying in IIIT / NIT etc - How you find college life? What you think what is the main reason of ragging? Why student commit suicide? Why student crosses all limits while ragging? Why student / juniors not able to resist ragging? How ragging changes your personality? You being the part of ragging?

Q 18: For students who are not in any college (drop out basically) - Do you think drop out is a good option? How mentally you are prepared for SCRA interview and other exams? Preparing for SCRA interview must have consumed 10-12 days of yours, will it affect your chances at other exams?

Q 19: Any suggestion regarding SCRA Exam -

Q 20: What do you feel we should go for online SCRA and other UPSC exam? What you have to say about CAT online exam

Q 21: Who is your favourite political leader? Do you feel Gandhism works now? Do you feel Manmohan Singh is a great PM? Which PM you will vote as the best PM of India? Indira Gandhi

Q 22: How you prepared for the NTSE Exam?

Q 23: Tell us something about your parent’s job.

Q 24: What you feel about the "youth factor" emerging in Indian politics? All politicians above 60 should retired from the active politics as in job?

Q 25: Full form of UPSC? Who appoints the chairman of UPSC (President)? It is an autonomous body. Who is the Chairman of UPSC? What is the role of UPSC in SCRA and Railways (Conducting exams for SCRA on behalf of Railways)

Q 26: From which constituency Miss Mamta Banerjee have been elected for Lok Sabha?

Q 27: Chairman Railway Board: SS Khurana

Q 28: Privatisation should be allowed in Inian railways? (Yes in some area like manufacturing and upgraation of technologies, time is changing and when private companies are coming in nuclear energy also, then we should expect greater role of private organisation in the Inidan Railways as well.

(*few pvt firms are already supplying to Indian Railways, we need to have more participation)

The government stand is that slowly they are allowing private companies in some sections of the Railways as in manufacturing of wheels, coaches etc. 
The main concern of privatisation of railways is with the laying down the tracks and running the trains. This is the field where government is very reserved.
Reason: Companies will stick to only profitable routes like Ahmeabad- Mumbai, Bangalore- Chennai - Hyderabad and the backwards areas would not be covered. Also the fare can be changed by various companies for their profit, thus affecting the poor man and the inflation.
As we have seen in Airlines, during the recession not only Indian Airlines suffers huge losses but almost all private airlines performed very badly. Privatisation should be allowed in Railways mainly to manufacturing sector and slowly other sectors should be opened.

During recession some of the world's private banks were struggling, so privatisation is not the "always right option". 
And this is what the stand of Indian government is.

Q 29: Suppose you want to lay down the railways track from Jodhpur to Kolkata, what technical problem you will face? - Well lot of answers but what you think about connecting this line to kolkata - Mumbai line, somewhere in between?

Q 30: Which of the following states relatively needs attention to develop Railway lines : Bihar, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and Rajasthan - Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh are the appropriate answers. Bihar already well developed, Rajasthan has very few big cities and most of it major cities are alread connected and more lines / trackes would not be as advantageous as it would be Maharashtra or Andhra Pradesh.

Q 31: Railways Organization Structure: Click here

Q 32: They can ask you anything, if you know then its fine, else there is no harm is saying NO.

Q 32: Sometimes few things need to be answered (for example your view) and in such cases when you dont know what to say then remember the follwoing rules:

• Rule 1: Answer should refelect your prositive attitude
• Rule 2: It should favour the government approach in general
• Rule 3: It should be as per general intellectual consensus
• Rule 4: Avoid to give clear answers like Yes / No, when dealing with policy matters.

Q 33: Question related to hobbies - web surfing

Sir I am very much interested in sports, sufing relevant websites when required and gardening. I have been the winner (name of the sport /championship). I like to read my caouse books and whenever i need to find info about any particular topic then besides regular help also opt for web surfing.

Q: What do you mean by relevant websites:
Ans: When i want some information about a topic, I search the topic online and go through the relevant websites.

Q : What you know about gardening?
Ans: Sir, Due to various time constraints I did'nt get the time as such to have lot of info about plants but I wish to be in my small garden whenever i get time.

Q : Which game you play? your records in the game? Who is the champion in that game

Q : Do you think that regular support is better or the online support is better?
Ans: Depends on the topic, Online we can get various information about various issues, however sometimes it takes lot of time to find exact information. However when we are looking for expert guidance or problem to some solution then conventional options are better (personal).

Q: Give one instance, when you surf online and you were excited with the information you gathered from the websites
Ans: Normally the comparisons of various technologies or like that I find very interesting. One such example was the 10 biggest IT failures previous year I was amazed to find that youtube.com was a major failure. Youtube is promoted by the Google. I dont have time but I like to read about various persons on line.

Q: Give us one thing which you dont find online?
Ans: I was unable to find lot of things about Sardar Vallabh Bhai patel, Normally we do find general things, but to find anything specific lot of hard work is required. It is very easy to find RMO paper of 2005 but it took lot of effort to find the paper of RMO 1995 online.

Q: So on which site you find the RMO 1995 paper?
Ans: Site i didnt remembered, it was an indian website by a student. I have bookmarked the site, but exact site name I didnt remembered.

Q: What do you think computer will change this world in time to come?
Ans: Computer saves lot of time and faciliates lot of things. SO inf uture when life becomes more busy and person looks for more facilities, computer will play majore role in time to come.

Q: In context on India?
Ans: Indian society has lot of gaps. Around 30% of Indians are below the pvoierty line while few are very rich. India will maintain the gap in years to come, though this gap would be shortened little bit in time to come.

Q: What do you think how we can shortened the gap?
Ans: By education and by giving them the scope and chance of learning and earning.

  Good Luck!!!!

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