Disclaimer: The following are the thoughts of Ms. Damini, and ForensicMCQ didn’t give her any sort of award or promise of money for writing it.
Tell Us About Yourself
My name is Damini Bushehri. I am from Shimla, Himachal Pradesh. I have done my Bachelor’s in Science with Zoology from the Center of Excellence Govt. College Sanjauli, Shimla, and Master’s in Forensic Science and Criminology from Panjab University Chandigarh.
I’ve worked as a Doubt Solving Educator at Unacademy and as a Senior Biology Teacher at 7Classes.
I have cleared FACT in Biological Sciences and NET JRF 2022. Looking forward to doing more and serving the nation with the same.
- Exam Cleared: October 2022 NTA UGC NET and JRF
Q1. Is it your first attempt?
No, it was not my 1st attempt, it was my 3rd attempt.
The first attempt was in 2019 when I was in 2nd semester of my master’s, and by preparing for only 2 months, I got a nice score that was just 2% less than the cut-off.
Then I decided to attempt the next exam, but I couldn’t able to prepare for my 2nd attempt much because of my dissertation work of last semester, and scored not more than 39% on that attempt, which was poor.
Finally, after my master’s got completed last year, I decided to prepare for the upcoming NET, and so yea this was my 3rd attempt.
Q2. How long have you been preparing for this Forensic NET/JRF exam?
Umm, as we all know that this exam was supposed to be held in June or July 2022, so I started my preparation in April 2022. But eventually, this exam happened after 5-6 months in October, so yea, I started my preparation in April. So it took me around 5-6 months.
Q3. Have you joined any coaching program for the preparation of NTA UGC NET? Did you recommend others to join one?
No, as such, I haven’t joined any coaching center or anything; I just took one subscription to the ForensicMCQ website for solved PYQs. Apart from this, I used YouTube for understanding different topics.
For paper 1, I took lectures from educators on YouTube; Kumar Bharat sir was one educator on YouTube that I followed for the basics of paper 1.
And for paper 2, I was reading books and making my notes, and if I want to thoroughly understand any topic again, I only used YouTube.
So, I haven’t joined any coaching so I couldn’t able to recommend it as well.
Q4. How was your ideal day (schedule) when you were preparing for the exam?
If I will tell you about my schedule, I was working as a senior Biology Teacher for a company.
So I had regular classes from 4 pm to around 8 pm, and I had the whole day before 4 pm, so I used to utilize that time of my day for preparation.
I usually devoted around 3 to 4 hours daily to preparations.
Q5. Are you able to follow your schedule regularly? What problem did you face?
I had my daily goals to achieve, like for 3 hours of this day I have to complete this topic, have to do this section of PYQs, and that’s it.
It is really fun to follow and achieve small goals each day, which kept me on schedule almost every day.
Q6. Do you study the whole day or night? Is it boring?
I studied for 3 to 4 hours of my day, and yes it was boring sometimes.
But eventually, I cracked the trick that whenever you are getting bored just switch the topic of study, take something interesting otherwise change the style of studying, like I used to teach myself whenever I was getting bored. I used to start writing on my board and teach myself like this is that, and we have to do this like that, and so on, which was fun.
And yea, the topic gets boring sometimes, but we have to find a way to make the learning interesting.
And, one more thing, whenever I was getting bored, I also starts solving PYQs, which awakens us to the fact that we don’t know so many things right now and we need to study more, and for that, we have to get back to the studies again. 🙂
Q7. What motivates you when you feel low while preparing?
My target motivates me a lot. I always wanted to do a Ph.D., but due to a not-so-good family financial situation, I have to hustle for JRF so I can do research without any hurdles. So this target of mine motivates me for this exam.
Q8. Did you feel any stress or relief when NTA changes the Forensic exam date? Is it tempting to lose focus on those days?
Yes, it was so disheartening for me as well when NTA kept changing exam dates.
We know, when we study, we have some targets of topics that we have to do till this date, but suddenly when exams come near and their date changes, our entire focus gets disbalance.
It took me 3 to 4 days to make my heart understand and resume preparing again till the next date of the exam. So, for that, I also joined the library for some time so I could able to get some exposure and to get my focus back on my studies.
Q9. Books your read for preparation of paper 1 and paper 2
During my first attempt, I used to study from K.V Madan for paper 1, but after that attempt, I realized that paper 1 is something that we cannot cover from the book alone, because the pattern of exams keeps changing year by year, and the level is getting up year by year, so preparing from the same book is not a good idea at all.
Apart from this, we can read from the book, explore PYQs, and then understand the topic as a whole from online sources, this can help a lot.
And for paper 2, if you have 3 to 4 months, I would recommend books like “Principles of Forensic Medicine and Toxicology” by Rajesh Bardale, “The Essentials of Forensic Medicine and Toxicology” by Dr. K.S. Narayan, “Forensic Biology” by Richard Li. And for other topics like Question documents, anthropology, and ballistics, I would prefer MSc. notes.
Q10. Online sources that help you in cracking JRF? (both paper 1 and paper 2)
Online sources for paper 1, let’s crack UGC NET channel teacher name Kumar Bharat sir. He was teaching concepts from basics and PYQs from the UGC NET website, mock tests.
For paper 2, PYQs from the Forensic Reader’s website (Forensicmcq.com), for short topics EPG- pathshala, savvy Forensic and Forensic Science YouTube channels, mock tests.
Q11. How do you learn MCQs? And how did forensicmcq.com help you with your JRF?
PYQs are a must for any competitive exam. It gives you an idea that what you have to do and what not. I recommend you solve PYQs as much as you can for both paper 1 and paper 2.
I was looking for solved PYQs on the internet and came to know about this website named Forensicmcq.com. They are providing solved PYQs which help us to know the level and pattern of the exam thoroughly and give us direction for preparation.
Q12. One key thing that helps you in cracking NET JRF?
This phrase will never become old fashioned, “Practice makes a man perfect.” So the key to cracking this exam is practice.
Reading and learning are one thing but practicing MCQs, and PYQs gives us direction. Practically, we can’t possibly learn everything on the syllabus, so by solving and practicing PYQs, we get to know which topics we should have more command over and which topics we can skip.
So, yea, practicing PYQs and MCQs on regular basis and making your study pattern and schedule around them will help you a lot.