Bringing laurels to the Valley, a 22 year old Mir Adfar Aaghaz of Anantnag district has qualified Indian Engineering Service (IES) exams and secured 26th rank at All India level. Adfar is the youngest one from Valley to qualify the exam in the first attempt.
The result of the IES exam was declared on April 12 this year.
The IES exam is conducted by Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) every year to recruit the candidates for the engineering service for various specialised positions in the Union Government departments.
Engineering Services Examination is a three-stage exam which includes Prelims, Mains and Interview. After qualifying all the three stages, the candidate gets selected for engineering services in different union government departments.
Mir Adfar Aaghaz is a resident of Katrun Mirbazar area of Anantnag but he has grown at his maternal house Kamad Anantnag and did his schooling there as well.
“I used to stay put at my maternal house till I completed my 10+2 schooling,” Adfar told Greater Kashmir.
He did his schooling up to class 10th from Iqbal Public High School Vessu and later passed his 10+2 from government higher secondary school Dialgam.
Adfar comes from a poor family but the financial constraints did not deter him from dreaming big.
“My father is a farmer and obviously I have faced financial constraints during my studies but I was always encouraged with the support of my family which would also boost my will power,” he said.
After completing his schooling, Adfar secured his admission in NIT Srinagar to pursue Civil engineering from the institute.
“I completed B.Tech Civil Engineering in 2019 but before that I appeared in GATE exams in my 7thsemester and secured 427th rank at all India level,” he said.
Given his good rank in GATE exams Adfar was offered admission for M.Tech in IIT but he preferred to start preparation for IES exams.
“It was not in my mind to appear in IES exams but after securing a good rank in GATE, I decided to prepare for IES exam to try my luck. I can say my performance in the GATE exam motivated me to start preparation for the IES exams,” he said.
Given the financial constraints, Adfar could not afford any coaching and decided to start self study for this prestigious exam. He completed his B.Tech in June 2019 and started preparation for IES exams.
“Private coaching was not affordable for me due to financial problems. I qualified the IES exam after doing self study at home during 2019 and 2020,” he said.
The notification for IES exam was issued in September 2019 three months after Adfar completed his B.Tech from NIT Srinagar.
“Our Preliminary exam was conducted in January 2020 and Mains was scheduled in October 2020. Then due to COVID-19 pandemic the interview was delayed to March 2021,” he said.