Tamanna, who grew up in Ranchi, the capital of Jharkhand, is now studying computer science at IIT Bombay. Cracking one of India's toughest entrance exams was not the result of any shortcut. It came from two years of a disciplined, carefully built strategy. She opened up her room, showed her notebooks and books, and explained in detail what real IIT-level preparation looks like behind the scenes.
What her room reveals about the grind
Tamanna said every notebook in her room is heavily highlighted in orange. She did not own a large number of books, but whatever she had was studied thoroughly and repeatedly. Her point is simple: the number of books piled up on a shelf does not matter nearly as much as how deeply the material inside them has actually been understood.
Quality over quantity, always
Tamanna has consistently valued quality of study over the number of hours put in. She pointed out that some students can study for 12 to 14 hours a day and still fail to grasp concepts, while others manage to score well after just 8 hours. What matters, in her view, is not how long you sit with a book but how well you actually study. Her own self study never crossed 4 to 5 hours a day, and she says that was enough, as long as it was done with complete honesty and focus.
A routine from 6 am to 10 pm, for two straight years
Through her two years of preparation, Tamanna followed a strict daily routine. She woke up at 6:00 am, went to school, attended coaching classes after school, and then sat down for self study before going to sleep by 10:00 pm. She never pulled an all nighter to study. Sleeping and waking up at fixed times was a rule she followed without exception. Whatever she studied, she studied with total focus and honesty, and that, she says, was her real strategy all along.
Sticking to NCERT and fixing every mistake in mock tests
When it came to books, Tamanna relied primarily on NCERT textbooks. Alongside that, she used the notes provided by her coaching institute. She kept her entire focus limited to just these two resources instead of getting lost among the dozens of other books available in the market. She also took mock tests repeatedly, and after each one, closely reviewed where exactly she was going wrong. Those mistakes were then corrected again and again until her concepts were 100 percent clear.
No parties, just a bit of cycling to unwind
Tamanna believes that reading a single good book 25 times and fully clearing its concepts is far more useful than trying to get through the thousands of books available in the market, since no student can realistically finish reading all of them. Across her two years of preparation, she did not attend parties. On the rare occasion she did go to one or two, that was an exception rather than the rule. To refresh her mood, she would simply cycle downstairs or go for a short walk, nothing more elaborate than that.
Her advice for students entering class 11
For students who are now entering class 11, Tamanna's advice is to work with consistency, because studying hard for just a single day achieves nothing. Study has to happen every day at a fixed time. She specifically stressed staying focused on NCERT and making sure every concept is fully understood, since that, in her experience, is what eventually leads to real success.
