My journey to become a Central Banker

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Mithilesh Kumar Kamat- RBI My journey to become a Central Banker Mithilesh Kumar Kamat Education: B.Tech (Mechanical Engineering), Delhi Technological University - 2017 Work-Ex - Officer Operations (Mechanical Maintenance), Indian Oil Corporation Limited – 1Yrs, 8 Months Attempt – 2 nd . RBI Grade B (DR) General- 2021 Disclaimer: There is no perfect strategy. Please do not follow anyone blindly. Have faith in yourself. Hi everyone, In this write-up, I will emphasize more on failures rather than success because failures are the stepping stone to success. Although I don’t believe there is any concrete definition of success, yet we interpret it in our own way. Please bear with me this is going to be a long read. How it all started? Right after my graduation I was placed in IOCL as Operations Officer in 2017. I was never serious about CSE but I don’t know why, I was preparing for it. May be due to peer pressure or something else. I appeared in CSE for two years 2018 and 2020 but obviously as I said it was not my cup of tea and I distanced myself from this preparation. Meantime, I started looking for other alternatives available because I was sure this is not the place (my previous employer) where I meant to be and spend rest of my life. Turning Point I started following regulatory body examinations and other competitive examinations which were at par with it from 2018 onwards. Unfortunately, due to my job commitments and other issues I wasn’t able to appear in most of the examinations and this is the time where I had to take decision because I didn’t want to skip other examinations like this. It was in Apr, 2019 when I decided to quit my job and start full time preparation. Everyone criticized my decision (which was quite obvious), and started talking that he will spoil his life now. It was my family who backed my decision and stood by me. They had faith in me that I would never let them down and fortunately after almost 2.5 years I am here narrating my story.

Transcript of My journey to become a Central Banker

Page 1: My journey to become a Central Banker

Mithilesh Kumar Kamat- RBI

My journey to become a Central Banker

Mithilesh Kumar Kamat

Education: B.Tech (Mechanical Engineering), Delhi Technological University - 2017

Work-Ex - Officer Operations (Mechanical Maintenance), Indian Oil Corporation Limited – 1Yrs, 8

Months

Attempt – 2nd.

RBI Grade B (DR) General- 2021

Disclaimer: There is no perfect strategy. Please do not follow anyone blindly. Have faith in yourself.

Hi everyone, In this write-up, I will emphasize more on failures rather than success because failures are the stepping stone to success. Although I don’t believe there is any concrete definition of success, yet we interpret it in our own way. Please bear with me this is going to be a long read.

How it all started?

Right after my graduation I was placed in IOCL as Operations Officer in 2017. I was never serious about CSE but I don’t know why, I was preparing for it. May be due to peer pressure or something else. I appeared in CSE for two years 2018 and 2020 but obviously as I said it was not my cup of tea and I distanced myself from this preparation.

Meantime, I started looking for other alternatives available because I was sure this is not the place (my previous employer) where I meant to be and spend rest of my life.

Turning Point

I started following regulatory body examinations and other competitive examinations which were at par with it from 2018 onwards. Unfortunately, due to my job commitments and other issues I wasn’t able to appear in most of the examinations and this is the time where I had to take decision because I didn’t want to skip other examinations like this. It was in Apr, 2019 when I decided to quit my job and start full time preparation. Everyone criticized my decision (which was quite obvious), and started talking that he will spoil his life now. It was my family who backed my decision and stood by me. They had faith in me that I would never let them down and fortunately after almost 2.5 years I am here narrating my story.

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My stint with examinations:

1. EPFO ASO 2019 – Pre out. 2. NMDFC 2019 – Interview out. 3. RBI Grade B 2019- Interview out. 4. CSE 2020- Pre out. 5. NABARD Grade A 2020- Mains out. 6. SEBI Grade A 2020- Mains out

7. NPS Grade A 2020 – Interview out

8. ECGC PO 2021- Pre out 9. RBI Grade B 2021- Final selection.

I did not mention other examinations as I appeared for the sake of QRE practice of preliminary examinations.

Be it mains or interview I have always fell short of the cut-off by a few margin. I missed NABARD mains by 0.5 marks, RBI Grade B 2019 by 2.25 marks, NPS Grade A – WL 1.

**Since it is going to be quite lengthy write up I will restrict myself to the RBI Grade B preparation only**

Phase 1

I think we all know what need to be done for this phase. So, I won’t go into the details. Let’s have a short discussion here. General Awareness – Earlier it is believed that GA is the key which still holds true but due to

unconventional paper this year, it was really hard to score in 60s and 70s out of 80.

Sources - There are a number of sources available. I would suggest at least two different sources must

be referred along with daily MCQs in order to get the taste of the questions being asked.

I referred two sources -BankersAdda daily quiz, {monthly compilation (QnA)+ Daily CA of Affairs Cloud.}

Why I am suggesting two sources because it will provide you the required revision to be done.

But there is a catch. When you'll cover 6-7 months of General Awareness it becomes difficult to revise

again. Here you must prepare your own notes (handwritten or onedrive) whatever is suitable for you

in a very precise manner. You will find out that two-three days before the examination you can revise

GA in a very efficient manner.

I had a small spiral and divided it into various sections - Finance, Eco, banking, awards, etc and jot

down the GA news in keywords.

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NOTE: - This year, questions asked in GA section were quite in-depth. You don’t need to panic here. If you have prepared well and still not able to answer then it is tough for everyone and cut-off will go down for sure. For e.g. RBI 2019 pre cut-off was around 122 and this year it was only 66.75

Quant, Reasoning and English - I didn't do any specific preparation for these sections but I gave a lot of

mocks and mocks and mocks and appeared in other examinations to know the pattern.

BankersAdda/Practice Mock/OliveBoard daily quizzes of Quant, Reasoning and English of SBI PO/IBPS

PO mains level to achieve that accuracy and speed. This exercise will keep you in touch with these

sections which are very important otherwise you will lose your pace. You may refer any YouTube

channel for concept clarity – Infinitesimal or Meritshine

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Phase - 2

For beginners it might be a gigantic task but trust me if proper schedule and relevant resources are

followed then it is quite possible to clear this phase in first attempt itself.

Now, the question is what one should refer?

Here, I would say explore the syllabus first. This is the best thing you can do. RBI does provide a

detailed syllabus of ESI, Finance and Management along with some standard books to be followed.

Ultimate decision is yours only, that how would you like to proceed and how will you stick to your

schedule because that's very important.

Suggestion - Look for the resources and read selectively as per the syllabus and your convenience.

How I prepared for phase 2? (Pattern change alarm)

19 Oct, 2020. This was the day when 2019 results were announced and I opened the pdf just to find

out that my roll number was not there.

I took my time to bring myself back to the preparation zone and without wasting much time I started my preparation again. But, in Jan 2021 when the notification released I was really disappointed as the patter was slightly changed. Descriptive sections were introduced in both the ESI and FM papers. But it was for everyone. So, no issue. :p

- 600 words for 15 markers ( 2 questions to be answered each in ESI and FM out of 3 choices) - 400 words for 10 markers ( 2 questions to be answered each in ESI and FM out of 3 choices)

It means effort required was doubled now because we still have to do whatever we have been doing for MCQs and additional practice for descriptive on keyboard was required now.

If you have answers in your mind then it becomes easy to type because your mind processes phrases faster than you type. If you would have to think of the answer and frame it in the real examination itself you will be in big trouble because you can bring that speed with pen-paper based examination not in typing one.

You must divide the ESI in different parts and prepare them accordingly.

Paper I – ESI – 100 Marks (50 Marks MCQ+50 Marks Descriptive)

ESI General Awareness - You won’t realize that you are already preparing for this part during your phase 1 GA itself. As I mentioned before to prepare short notes which would eventually help you in 1 marker ESI question, please do this exercise on daily basis if time allows. It will hardly take 20-30 mins on daily basis. Stick to the resources you have followed. (Affairs Cloud Daily CA).

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PIB – In my previous attempt I did not follow PIB directly instead I referred some compilation. I believe that instead of compilation we should refer PIB from the website itself. With the syllabus in your mind, only 15-20 minutes daily will give you important news that should be covered for the examination. I used to make notes on Onenote app from mobile itself (it’s quite handy). I am attaching images for the same. Just copy the important paragraphs

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Government Schemes – This section will cover a major portion of 2 marker questions of ESI. I think most of the fellow aspirants have this query how to cover government schemes?

Trust me there is no such strategy to memorize it all. I believe this was the section which kept me out of the final list last year as I devoted too much time here. ROI was quite less. I won’t recommend anyone to go through the compilations explicitly for preparing government schemes. If you will start following PIB on daily or weekly basis you will encounter with a lot of schemes. For e.g. there were 3 paragraph based question on PM-KISAN as recently 9 crores beneficiaries received the entitlement and it was covered in the PIB(although all the major compilations, newspapers would have covered the news, we have to stick to the restricted sources.) So, best way to cover the scheme is read the current affairs through PIB and if any scheme is mentioned immediately read it from any compilation or mark it in your notebook to read the same later. You will cover major important schemes without boredom. Finishing a compilation is itself a huge task. Sometimes Old Schemes from 1990s are also being asked so please pay attention to old schemes as well (You will find out their mention eventually in some news in PIB).

In this way, after a month you will realize you have covered a good number of schemes in a month. It looks like time taking but when you are aware of the syllabus filtering will become easy.

Ranking and Indices – Well, this section is equally important. Although I consider this segment as a part of GA only yet it may fetch you some easy marks if asked that’s why I am citing this one as a different section. While preparing GA you will observe that a number of International Organizations releases their reports and rank different countries based on certain parameters frequently. In the same way different domestic bodies such as NITI releases some different reports frequently. What you are supposed to do is just segregation. I.e. create a section of Reports and Indices in your notebook (onenote/evernote) and just note them down as and when a new report is released. For e.g. “Name of the report”, “Released by”, “Static part of the organization”- HQ, President etc., “Parameters”, “India’s Rank”, “Top and bottom position occupier”. After doing this exercise you will have some good number of reports in a handy manner. When some coaching institutes releases their compilation just note down the left one and you are good to go in this section as well.

Census/SECC – There will be hardly 1 or 2 questions from this section or may be not even a single question. Although the weightage is quite less yet it becomes very important because only direct factual question will be asked. You can refer official document for the same. I did glance through simple google search along with AffairsCloud MCQs. There is a document uploaded for the same on Skidha's Blog. **Do refer his blog – highly recommended**

Static Economics – This year static Economics was the game changer. Earlier, weightage of static part was quite less. So, aspirants do not used to prepare this portion well. But this time,

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due to the addition of descriptive part, importance of static portion increased manifold because 50% weightage was assigned for descriptive and probability of static question being asked in this section was obviously quite high. I had basic understanding of economics and various terminologies but again, typing a 600/400 word was something different. You have to give your time to understand the basic economics terminologies such as GDP,GNP, National Income, FTP, SEZ, Industrial policy, LPG, Fiscal policy, Budget, IMF, WTO, BOP, Deficits etc. For this, you may either refer to NCERT of XI/XII or some standard books such as Ramesh Singh/Vivek Singh Economy

Just after the notification I started reading Vivek Singh Economy book as per the syllabus(You can download it from his Telegram Channel or buy it from Amazon) - Vivek Singh Economy In order to practice in a better way as I was anxious due to descriptive nature I purchased CrackGradeB course as it is affordable and crisp. I am thankful to the team as they provided brief and to the point notes on all the static topics such as poverty, migration, urbanization, growth and development, social justice topics etc.

Mrunal Economy and BES series can be referred for concept clarity or revision purpose.

Suggestion: Start preparing for the answer typing from the very beginning. It is not the test

of typing but you have to be at the pace where you can complete the paper. I would recommend to frame at least 10-15 question each for ESI and FM. In this way, you’ll practice some odd 30 questions and then again type them with a timer. It is necessary to know how much time you are taking to type 10 or 15 markers so that you can have a rough idea and brief strategy on how to attempt descriptive section.

Union Budget/Economics Survey – It is advised that students must refer these two documents. If one is interested then she/he must read the original document but sometimes paucity of time doesn’t allow so especially for the working professionals. So, the best you can do is to watch the telecast of budget and survey on YouTube and later read from the compiled source of any institution. In fact, PIB itself releases budget summary and survey summary. Note down the important points and revise them. Not much questions were asked this year in MCQ format from budget/survey but it will definitely add on some benefit to your understanding and give you some fodder points to mention in your descriptive answers (one direct question regarding any 5 important announcements in UNION BUDGET was asked in FM section) and will help you in interview as well. I referred live telecast of budget/survey and PIB summary of both the documents along with MCQ released by coaching institutes.

Newspaper – This is the most ignored part of the preparation. People usually refer some good compilation of monthly GA and don’t care about the importance of News Paper. Reading habit will sail you through descriptive English and phase 1 English. It is not necessary to read the entire newspaper, just a few articles on daily basis once you have deciphered the syllabus will be more than enough. I used to read important 4-5 articles daily. (Business standard/ LiveMint) I would recommend to read newspaper diligently after phase 2.

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Paper II – English – 100 Marks

This is the most ignored paper of RBI Grade B. I still don’t know why people always do injustice to this paper. They give their whole time in preparation of Finance & Management keeping in mind that both the subjects being new to them (Non Finance background) and they’ll manage English then trust me it’s a blunder. I personally know a number of candidates who, despite scoring such a good marks in ESI+FM couldn’t make it to the final list in 2019 just because of the English Descriptive. Considering the pattern of RBI Grade B I would say English is that low hanging fruit which can be easily plucked. Trust me; there is no advantage to the UPSC background candidate in this paper. Descriptive English is not about essay only, moreover the kind of essay content is quite different from CSE essay. Nobody knows how they evaluate paper but there are some pointers which have to be followed.

No grammatical mistake.

Stick to the word limit.

Do not forget to mention the question number and Title (if asked). If properly analyzed, English can fetch you really good marks. It carries 1/3rd of the total weightage of written test. I scored 66.5 in 2019. Will share my 2021 score once it is released.

You will have ample amount of time there to complete your paper but still it is advisable to practice typing frequently. It will give you an edge to finish your paper early and you can use that extra time in proofreading to eliminate misspelled words and faulty sentences which ultimately costs you some marks. What I did? By reading a newspaper article you will be preparing for all the three sections of Descriptive English- Essay, Reading Comprehension and Précis simultaneously. This is the best thing you can do to crack English by being consistent in this daily small activity. ROI is huge. We used to write précis (130-150 words) on any news article of around 350-400 words. In morning one of the group members used to post an article on the group and by the end of the day all the members used to share their Précis on the group. Peer evaluation gives you the insight where you stand among the peers. This became the weekly schedule until we almost wrote some 15-20 précis. Post analysis of your précis with your peer’s précis will give you idea about how to improve further.

Start typing on grammarly to eliminate silly mistakes of articles and other small errors. You need not to do this activity daily. A weekly schedule is enough and you will practice around 8-10 precis and essays in a few months. I would suggest making a small group of 50-60 members and doing this exercise along with essay evaluation.

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Paper III – Finance and Management – 100 Marks (50 Marks MCQ+ 50 Marks Descriptive)

I think most of the student misinterpret this subject as a major component of the examination although it is just a combination of two different subjects. Majority of the candidates appearing in RBI Grade B exam are from engineering background and it’s quite natural for them to be worried about Finance as a subject but reality is you are doing over work for mere 50-54 marks of finance which is not required at all. Why I am saying this because we can easily fetch rest of the 46-50 marks from Management portion with a very minimal effort. In-fact going with the trend a very few or no numerical is being asked in the examination. But we must prepare for the worst and also these topics are not much difficult if paid attention wisely.

Management –

The syllabus of management is pretty concise. If proper attention is being paid this subject can be covered within a week or two along with the preparation of your short notes for revision. I am stressing again and again on revision that too from your own prepared notes. During your preparation you will understand the importance of your own notes. There are some standard books such as S.P. Robbins or IGNOU material/Edutap notes that everyone refers. But, how you retain those theories in your own way is very important because there are plenty of them which you can’t memorize. You have to look for your own way of remembering terms and parameter. Questions asked in the examination will be very basic in nature yet confusing due to the nature of the subject.

What I did? This year we saw some addition in the syllabus such as Ethics, Emotional Intelligence, Conflict, Organizational behavior & Change, and Perception I had already prepared my own notes of management and devoted 4-5 days to finish these topics. Simple google search will give you a lot of materials on these topics just match it with the syllabus provided and prepare accordingly. You can also search new topics on this web-portal e-pathshala For old topics, I referred EduTap summary sheets and prepared notes for a quick revision. You can also refer Management Study Guide for better understanding. Here is sample of my notes of Organizational Behaviour and Emotional Intelligence.

https://www.evernote.com/shard/s615/sh/c450bf73-9217-dddc-0023-6222757eb428/e935d86247795d981a98437cb6e1688d

https://www.evernote.com/shard/s615/sh/3ee9d1ed-39e7-25e8-802f-5948ee97f971/3cfc2a503e09b0c50306a6d0b2ba59bb

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Finance – First thing first – If you are reading newspaper on daily basis – (any financial newspaper such as – Financial Express, Live Mint, The Hindu Business Line, Economic Times etc) you will come across various jargons such as bonds, funds, portfolio, market cap, stock movement, derivatives, RBIs guidelines, Fed guidelines, SEBI guidelines etc. So, before jumping into the syllabus analyze the syllabus first. When you will analyze it and start to inculcate that syllabus to your memory you will develop the art of leaving. This is one of the important aspects of the preparation. Unlike in UPSC here you have a crisp boundary beyond which you need not to travel unless you are a wanderer.

I personally followed Business Standard.

Start with RBI’s FAQ section. RBI’s website is itself the best preparation spot for finance. FAQ section covers a lot of topics in QnA format that will definitely create your base to understand the basic terms.(some sections not updated) When you’ll develop the habit of decoding FAQ eventually you have to make transition from FAQ to other section as well such as Notification released, Press release and various reports. (It will help you in interview as well.)

What I did? I went through the FAQ thoroughly. I usually glanced through the FAQ before I sleep so that I can cover as much as I can through my mobile during night hours.

https://www.evernote.com/shard/s615/sh/593dc05a-a5d6-d6b6-5191-554b5949d05c/59616eea0a3efacbc527bc09e4398645 - RBI FAQ PDF

Once you are almost done with FAQ- prepare your short notes either in softcopy or hardcopy as per your convenience. (Only keywords – no need to do PhD) I prepared short notes of notification released on weekly basis from the website itself. This will cover your Finance Current Affairs. By doing this you will observe when you were reading General Awareness magazine you have read finance general awareness there which is nothing but notification only comprising 30-40% of finance current affairs.

Soon you will realize everything is interlinked. Now, coming to the syllabus RBI suggested some standard books such as Prasanna Chandra. As I mentioned earlier analyze the syllabus first, you will observe you don’t need to read the whole book either Prasanna or Bharti Pathak. Only selective reading is required. I must say syllabus is the savior here otherwise it will blow your mind. Just mark the topics as per syllabus and start reading them.

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Static portion -

If you have time there is no substitute of books. In fact coaching materials itself are from those books only. I referred investopedia excessively for concept clarity and instead of books I took the EduTap notes here. I did refer books for a few chapters but found out materials provided by coaching institutes are replica so instead of segregating and marking I restricted myself to the notes only. I completed each and every chapter gradually and prepared my own crisp notes. There are some chapters which have complete theory ( risk, PPP, AIFI, Inflation, fiscal/monetary policy, banking history, e-gov, corporate gov, rbi and its function, financial inclusion, FRBM etc) while some have concepts and numerical (TVM, bonds, ratio analysis, income statement, break even analysis etc)

For Numerical –

What you can do is note down all the necessary formulae on A4 sheet. It will take maximum two A4 sheets to cover all of them as per syllabus. Practice some of the numerical frequently. In fact you can cover the TVM and ration analysis from XI/XII NCERT of Accounts book (available on NCERT website. I referred it for ratio analysis and some other small numerical. It will hardly take a day or two to do this exercise. I still have those notes of formulae which can be revised in no time provided you have your basic concepts of terminologies.

https://www.evernote.com/shard/s615/sh/9cac4372-56b8-1c85-4688-ff263a6e9c62/96540809d4bc7098f53c6df80db26282 FM Formulae

For Theory – After covering this entire important portion, you just read the notes or books as per syllabus and prepare your notes. Once you are done with one time reading along with the preparation of notes you will have your own prepared notes which can be revised for a number of times as per your convenience. You need not to refer those books, notes in your laptop again and again.

3-4 days before the D-day it is your notes which will be your savior. In 3-4 days you can cover the entire ocean in no time without leaving any important part of your syllabus.

For descriptive part I have already explained in the static economic portion. Repeat the same process here. A few topics have been added in the syllabus keeping in mind the descriptive nature of the examination such as – Impact of GFC 2007-08, FinTech, Global Financial Market etc. Once you start covering syllabus you will get to know which chapter is meant for descriptive and which one is for MCQ.

Phase 2 Mocks –

Mocks are always helpful. But, this time as pattern was changed I think it becomes difficult for even edtech platforms to frame a good quality mocks. As I had CrackGradeB course so I attempted all of the 5+5 MCQ mocks of ESI and FM.

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Phase 3 – Interview- 75 Marks

Here comes the last step of the ladder which is the most important one. It may make or break your

chances to be in the final merit list.

Interviews are considered to be just a “Personality Test”. But, it doesn’t mean that your personality will fetch you all the 75 marks. You have to be vigilant during the interview. They expect you to be versed with the current happenings in the economy of not only our country but the world’s economic situation too. Don’t forget to greet the panel with a smile. Sometimes it’s ok to say sorry if you aren’t confident enough to answer any question. It’s better to skip rather than bluffing them.

However, there are some pointers one must take care of as described below:-

1. Bio-data – Well, it’s quite obvious that your bio-data will play a huge role during your interview. You have to be versed with your bio-data thoroughly. Just prepare 30-40 questions on your own on the basis of your bio-data or ask your friends to do so, that can be asked. Any work-ex, your educational background, your hometown (any interesting fact), your hobbies, any certification you have mentioned (why you have done this particularly?) etc. Try to answer all the questions you have formed out of your bio-data beforehand.

2. Current Affairs – Although you must have been reading CA throughout your preparation yet it becomes very important when we talk about interview. Why? There may be some issues which are related to RBI directly/indirectly happening during interview period. E.g. Last year PMC crisis, Urban Co-op banks control, and many other news were hot topics and this year MasterCard Issue, data protection, Financial Inclusion Index, Digital Payment Index etc. were some topics which were in news. So, pay attention wisely and try to figure out topics to be prepared. Try to build your own opinion – panel loves it.

3. Static Finance/Economic issues- Sometimes not only the current topics, some past issues which have caused heavy damage to the economy were also being asked. So, you have to be aware of in depth clarity of these issues. In-fact I have been asked about GFC 2008 in my previous interview. Try to understand some past issues which are very important. E.g. Asian Financial Crisis, GFC 2008, Current Account Convertibility etc.

4. RBI- There is a document RBI's Function and Working. It will give you basic understanding of how RBI works. All the questions pertaining to RBI can be answered from this book only. Give it a good read you’ll enjoy as well. I would recommend start reading this book right after your phase 2 examination. Some other documents such as RBI Act, Banking Regulation Act, PSS Act and publications e.g. Half yearly Monetary Policy Report, Financial Stability Report etc need to be done as and when released.

5. Peer Group- In my opinion, it is very important to find a group of people who are as serious as you are for this examination. I consider myself fortunate enough to be a part of such a brilliant group in which 10 out of 16 interview appeared candidates made it to the final list. As much as I am happy for my selection and other members, I am equally sad for those who couldn't make it to the final list. All of us had worked really hard together in this journey. This is a sad reality

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that we have to deal with. I would like to mention a few people here and thank them who were there with me in this journey virtually- Kunal, Debashish, Sandeep, Sumit (a very good writer- I am hoping to see him soon in RBI), Yashwanth, Rambhaji, Ravi, Ajay, and many more. Shivam has been doing a great work through his Telegram Channel (RBI Grade B with Shivam). If you have not joined his channel yet do join it ASAP. It will only help you to a great extent to move forward in this journey. Quizzes, doubt clearing sessions, important newspaper articles etc. will help you to prepare in the right direction. Special thanks to Shubham Goel and Vaishali Ma’am for inspiring us throughout the journey.

Mock Interview- It is always advisable to appear for a mock interview in order to calm down your nerves. For a fresher it is an ice breaking experience. I was not planning to appear in any mock interview this year but I ended up appearing in one mock which I must say was very wonderful. I asked for a mock interview to the CrackGradeB learning platform where one-on-one mock session on zoom was scheduled with Saurabh Sir, who is an educator with Shubra Ranjan IAS platform. He gave me some valuable inputs which I think might have helped me this year doing better in the interview (Although scores aren’t released yet). Back to back two sessions on different days were schedules to find out whether I was taking care of the suggestions or not.

Here is my Interview transcript-

Chairman: Amitabh Rajan Sir Time: 20 minutes

Chairman: Okay (addressing my name) we have gone through your bio data. Now, we know your qualifications, your extra-curricular, your previous work profile, your last year’s attempt. Now you have 3 minutes to make us believe why we should hire you? What different you have done this year? What went wrong last year? How you can be a better candidate for selection? (All questions in one go) -I was expecting a monologue as well but this was a complete bouncer. All of these questions at once made me anxious. Chairman allowed me to take a pause for a few seconds and then I started answering each question one by one. M1: Why did you resign? Any specific reason? -Answered as prepared. M1: You must have prepared a lot, can you tell us the various sources you have referred? -Answered as prepared.

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M1: Can you summarize annual report? A brief summary. -Answered as prepared. Here instead of quoting data I approached it in a different way. I started by quoting the section 53(2) of RBI Act and then explained that the annual report comprises of 2 parts - part 1 and part 2 Part 1 is about economic overview and current assessment and future prospects. Part 2 speaks about the metrics related to working and functions of RBI. It covers all the details of the activities carried out by the central bank throughout the year with way forward across each functions. Chapter 12 explicitly represents the Reserve Bank's Annual balance statement and income statement

😂 (He stopped me here- okay!)

M2: Okay, so we are now aware of your reason for leaving your previous job and what you have been doing since then. Tell us how our economy is struggling right now? -Answered as prepared. M2: Did you find any difference between 1st and 2nd Covid wave? -Answered. Long discussion here with many cross questions. M2: Tell us something more in technical way w.r.t 2nd wave. -Long discussion here as I mentioned data regarding high frequency data (May be he was looking for these data only).

F1: You know about the monetary policy committee. Can you describe the MPC performance from your last interview to the present time? -Answered as prepared. Long discussion here as I quoted the Report on Currency and Finance here. F1: How efficiently we can keep ourselves updated? (What do you prefer?) -Answered. Told print and Television media and I prefer print media (Newspaper) F1: And Social Media? -Answered. Told it lacks authenticity F1: What about books (follow up question)? Last book you have read -Answered.

Chairman – Okay, Thank you Mithilesh, your Interview is over.

Parting words

It is not necessary that you will win every battle in one go, there are some battles that take some time to conquer. Some will do it in the first attempt, some in the last. It is quite possible that some may never be able to make it even after trying their best because sometimes the luck factor plays a huge role. But it doesn’t mean we should stop trying. Just don’t get attached to the process too much, otherwise it will hurt.

Page 15: My journey to become a Central Banker

Mithilesh Kumar Kamat- RBI

Just remember:

“There is always a light at the end of the tunnel” Eventually, you will find yourself in the position where you were meant to be and were destined to. Exams are just the part of your life not the life.

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