The twin states of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh continued their winning streak by bagging five out of top 10 All India Ranks in the Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) Advanced 2016; all five are students of Narayana Sri Chaitanya IIT Academy.

The winning five are Jeevithiesh Duggani (AIR 4), Sai Teja Talluri (AIR 5), G Nikhil Samrat (AIR 7), Praneeth Reddy (AIR 8) and Vighnesh Reddy Konda (AIR 10). With eyes set on IIT-Bombay, four out of five toppers plan to pursue a career in computer science. However, Vighnesh Reddy Konda is keen to join aeronautical engineering as he finds space science fascinating.

While speaking to PaGaLGuY, Jeevithiesh Duggani, who hails from Vijayawada, said he had expected a good show. “After having had secured top ranks in other exams such as EAMCET and JEE (Mains), I was confident that I would bag the top spot in JEE (Advanced),” he said. Sai Teja Talluri, who bagged the top spot in JEE (Mains), plans to start his firm after pursuing a career in computer science. “I want to start my company that would be into programming and gaming,” he said. Talluri had put in nearly seven years of hard work at the Narayana Sri Chaitanya IIT Academy to make the cut.

Unlike other toppers who spent hours into studying, it was a cakewalk for Nikhil Samrat, who secured AIR 7. “I restricted myself to studying while I was at my institute. After coming home, I never did any additional revision,” he said. Samrat wants to be a researcher. “After graduating in computer science, I want to do research into Physics as I believe there is a lot of scope in that subject,” he said.

While other students attributed their success to parents and teachers, Praneeth Reddy said it was a regular meditation that helped him concentrate. “I used to perform yoga every alternate day. Regular Suryanamaskaars and Pranayams helped me keep my stress levels under control,” said Praneeth, who too aims to start-up his software company in the future.

Taking an altogether different route, Vighnesh Reddy Konda plans to be an astronaut one day. “I intend to land on the moon in 2025. I feel extremely fascinated with the constellations. During my free time, I access the Stellarium app, which helped me learn a lot about astronomy,” said Reddy.

Overall, the two Telugu-speaking states have sent 3,965 engineering aspirants to IITs this year. Of these, 2,516 students are from Telangana and remaining 1,449 from Andhra Pradesh.