DRDO Interview Experience

Notification for the DRDO application mostly starts in April(Maybe very). It required a valid gate score to shortlist for the written examination. In 2019 for CSE Gate score

The cutoff was 576 (OBC). After shortlisting for the Written exam we will get a notification for hall permit, etc.

• Exam date: 13th November 2019.
• Interview Date: 3rd February 2020 at DRDO Delhi center.
• Written Exam: Written exam was subjective. Two subjective papers were there. The first paper was from 9 am to 12 pm and the second one was from 2 pm to 5 pm.
• Interview Shortlist: Second week of January.

Interview: I reached the DRDO center at 9 AM. Then there was some paperwork on the first floor after completing those they provide us id card. Then we went to the 2nd floor of the building where the interview was going to conduct. In that room, we were 9 people and my number was the last one. So I was interviewed from 12:00 pm to 12:45 pm.

1. In the interview panel, there were 5 members.
2. Tell me about yourself.
3. What are your favorite subjects? (They asked for four subjects) – I replied DS, Algo, CN, OS]
4. An array is given whose n is not known and after some numbers, $ is stored then find the position from where $ is stored.
5. Explain the given URL. Like if https://www.quora.com/r/nultyr45x then explain everything.
6. How the packet transmits, explains at each level of the OSI/IS model.
7. Difference between a logical and physical address and full form of MAC.
8. There were some questions from software engineering for that I was not able to answer most of the questions.
9. In the end, they asked about my projects which I explained my Btech project.
10. The interview was continued for 45 minutes. After that, you have to fill in the details for your traveling fairs and alls because they will return your travel fares (Upto 2nd class AC).

Result: I was not selected, just because I didn’t perform well in the interview. 

My preparation strategy:

1. Since I am doing my master from NIT Calicut (At that time I was in the first semester), I had to manage both classes and preparation as well. So I decided to start my preparation only after my 1st-semester end sem exam. My exam was ended on 25th October 2019 and from 27 October 2019, I started my preparation.
2. During my preparation, I revised all the subjects and few maths topics were different from the gate, so I prepared those topics as well except for software engineering.
3. I completed my revision on 10th November and I took on more days for important topics that I marked during preparation, and on 12th October I had to travel to Bangalore exam center from Calicut.

Suggestions:

• Don’t be panic about this exam, just revise all the subjects properly, and make short notes for new subjects as well for quick revision.
• If you are a college-going student then manage your time in such a way you can perform well in both places.