We had started preparing for the first company –TCS some 4-5 days back and as usual the night-outs throughout the hostel ensured that everyone knew the PLACEMENT time had arrived. Even with a not-so-fat package of 2.5 LPA, we were almost ready to beg for that enviable job. Afterall the first job is a first job! 
We really didn’t know that every company bragged about itself in a similar fashion.

There were 3 rounds of elimination beginning with an aptitude test. This test was followed by a round of technical interview and then a HR interview.

Round 1: Aptitude Test 
Time: 7.30 P.M.

Aptitude test was an online test set on the lines of GRE (Graduate Record Examination), though it was much tougher than that. It had a verbal section and a quantitative section. Since this was my first aptitude test, I had no idea what to expect in the exam. My rusted brain refused to work in the difficult quant section. (I can’t accuse my brain of not working in the verbal section because I had never seen the words that popped up in the verbal section all my life.)I went trigger happy and clicked whatever came to my mind, being extremely sure of not clearing the exam.

Here’s TATA to TATA.

But miracles happen. And strangely, it happened with me. I had cleared the aptitude exam merely by luck! The next round was that of technical interview. Around 60% of the people who had appeared for the Aptitude test were filtered.

Round 2: Technical Interview 
Time: 5.30 P.M , Next Day

The interviews were held in and around the auditorium. Around 4-5 interviews were being held simultaneously. Two people were interviewing one person. After my name was called, I was shown the table where I was supposed to go display my ‘technical knowledge’. 

I saw a young happy-looking man and one young not-so-happy looking woman. I gave them both a broad smile, wished them and took a seat. 

From now on, I will be referring to the male interviewer as QM and the woman as QF for the sake of convenience. I will refer to myself as just Me.  
Here it goes… 
QM: (Reads my résumé) so, what are your hobbies? 
Me: Sir, I enjoy writing, reading. I write poems as well. 
QM: Writing? (Thinks) OK. What do you have to say about Shobha De as a writer? 
Me: Sir, I like writing because it helps me de-stress. I am not a professional writer nor have I read Shobha De’s novels.. 
QM: OK. (Seems satisfied with my answer)What is your rank in the class? Are you among the top five? 
Me: No sir. I mean, yes sir. (Fumbled a little).Sir actually I used to consistently be among the top 3 when I was in school. In college, I have been among the top(mmmm what should I say? Ten.. Twenty) 15. Top 15 yes. Also, I work very hard to improve my grades each time. You can see from my résumé that my grades show an upward trend from the first semester to the last. 

QM: Ya I can see. You’ve done a project on ASP.net. 
Me: Ya (Now they’re coming to my territory, Yippiee) 
QM: What’s the difference between ASP.net and ASP? 
Me: ASP.net is extended form of ASP. 
QF: And? 
Me: And.. (what should I say).. and.. I know only ASP.net not ASP. 
(How stupid an answer was that. I don’t know) 
QM: What are recordsets? 
Me: (Stumped) Donno 
QM: Have you written the codes yourself? 
Me: Ya.. Took help from the net. 
QF: Which all sites did you refer to? 
Me: (Hell, who bothers to look at the site’s name. We only know google.com) Don’t remember. Not any one in particular. Many sites. 
QF: Who remembers the sites names; One only googles it out. (smiles) 
(Are they reading my mind. This is getting serious)

QM: OK. You had electronics also as one subject rite?. Tell me what material is used in a LED. 
Me: (God knows what happened to me and I misunderstood LED as bulb and answered the question as confidently as possible) Tungsten. 
QM: (Amused and puzzled) Are you sure? 
Me: (Was still in my own sweet ignorance, smiled and answered) Yes sir, very much. 
QM: Let me give you a hint, the name of that material starts with a ‘G’ 
Me: (Thought for a long time, gazed at the trees outside and tube lights on the ceiling,as if expecting them to answer for me. After exhibiting all possible signs of the classical idiot, I answered) Gold? 
QM: (This time he made no efforts to restrain his laughter, laughed out loud) No, think again. Material used in a LED? 
Me: Sorry sir, I don’t know ( Still thinking about bulbs) 
QM: The material used is Gallium –Arsenide. 
Me: Oh, OK. (Still not understanding what Ga-As could possibly do in bulbs. This is what pressure can do to you. Only after coming home had I realized how silly I had been) 
QM: How would you rate yourself in C? 
Me: 6… 7.  
QF: 6 or 7? 
Me: 6.5 (and laughed! Was this the blunder of the evening!) 
QM: Ok, so let me ask you only basic questions. What is stdio.h and conio.h? 
Me: (Something happened to me and I got too scared to answer) Sir I don’t know. 
QM: You don’t know? Didn’t you write basic programs using C and C++? 
Me: Sir I did. stdio.h and conio.h are header files. 
QM: Very good. Why didn’t you answer earlier? 
Me: Sir I thought you wanted more details. 
QF: (some question regarding C++ which I could not answer) 
QM: Give an example of inheritance from real life. 
Me: Child inheriting properties from his parents. 
QM: What is the difference between private, protected and public classes? 
Me: (answered whatever I knew) 
QM: (Huge smile) Perfect. You many leave.

Yippee!!!

I had qualified for the next round.

Round 3: HR Interview 
Time: 9 P.M.

An elderly gentleman was taking the HR interviews one by one in his cabin. 
My turn.

Me: Good evening sir. 
HR: Good evening (going through my résumé and test’s and interview’s result sheets) I see that you have scored low in the tests. 
Me: Sir I must have scored low in the verbal section because it is very difficult to remember all the words from the wordlist and besides that, I am not studying for the GRE so I was less prepared for this kind of test. ( Oh shit! What did I say?) 
 
But that kind of had a positive impact on him. 
HR: (Seems convinced) what do you know about TCS? 
Me: Blabbered something that I could remember from the morning’s pre placement talk. 
HR: What do your parents do? 
Me: (Answered) 
HR: Working with TCS involves a lot of hard work. Are you ready for that? 
Me: Sir I am not afraid of hard work. Engineering itself isn’t very easy and to stay ahead in the race, I have been working hard since day 1. 
HR: (Seems satisfied with my answers) OK. You may leave.

Finally, the individual marks of all the tests and interviews were clubbed to get a final score. They assembled all of us in the auditorium.

Time: 11 P.M.

A woman declared, “These are the students we have selected.” The list went on and on and I waited eagerly for my name to be called. She stopped all of a sudden. “OK everyone, that is it.” 
All hopes were shattered. In a minute she smiled again and asked, “Is it? Was anyone else expecting to make it here?”  
A few people raised their hands. She continued,” Very good, we are awaiting such confident people in TCS” 
More names were called out .My happiness knew no bounds when my name was in one of those selected.

A year and half later… 
I did not join TCS as I had opted a better company (at least then it was better:-)). Infact only 15 out of the 90 odd selected actually joined TCS. But this experience will certainly remain a special one for me and TCS will always remain something very close to my heart.

~Contributed by a NaradBhakt