Can I skip questions in GATE?

GATE rewards you for skipping a question. Minimise negative marks and save time! Skipping the difficult questions and attempting the questions you are confident in, are the key highlights of on-the-day GATE strategy.

Attempting more number of questions is not the Mantra.

But yeah, the most important thing here is choosing the questions which are difficult or selecting the questions which will take more time. This is the smartest and easiest way to win over GATE.

GATE is NOT about attempting more questions, it is also about leaving the undoable questions. It rewards you when you leave difficult or time-consuming questions.

GATE Exam day strategy

We are very near to GATE 2021, so the preparation strategy may be very different from the last moment strategy.

During your exam, if you know that you can skip 10 questions and still get a top rank in GATE, it makes you feel relaxed. You will not be wasting time in solving questions which are taking more than 5 minutes to solve.

You should use it as a guide, and not like okay I have to score exactly 75 marks.

• If the exam is easy, you might have to attempt more questions.

• If the exam is difficult, you can afford to skip one or two more questions.

The key to the idea is to focus on improving your accuracy. You should be able to believe in what you are solving. This is self-confidence! You have to convince yourself in a positive way. how to solve? where to start? Whether the formula is pretty right? Whether the calculation is neat and perfect?

Never skip NATs and MSQs. You know why! Simple, they do not have negative marks.

When you are underprepared - you will start doubting yourself whether what you solved is right.

Accuracy Vs Question skipping rate

Say, you have got your accuracy to a good level. You are rarely making mistakes. How many questions can you skip in GATE?

If you are going to score 75+ marks with 95% accuracy, you can actually skip 13 questions. Isn't that great?

At 85% accuracy, to score 75+ you can only skip 5 questions!

Now that you know how much to score, and how many questions you can skip - just make a mental note of it. Skipping questions will work perfectly fine if and only if you reduce the negatives.

Ways to Reduce Negatives

In GATE, except NATs and MSQs all other questions have negative marking. If you are getting a one mark question wrong, you have to pay a negative mark of 0.33 and If you are getting a two mark question wrong, you have to pay a negative mark of 0.66.

If you are attempting a one mark question and doing it wrong, your expected score gets reduced by 1.33 and you wasted not less than 3 minutes of your valuable 180 minutes.

If you are attempting a two mark question and doing it wrong, your expected score gets reduced by 2.66 and you wasted not less than 5 minutes of your valuable 180 minutes.

Calculative risk is too much risk to handle in GATE, even risker than the stock market if you are not Harshad Mehta ;) So, it is always better to leave a question unattempted rather doing it wrong. This is a practical scenario.

P.S: In case of unsure NATs and MSQs you can take a risk, you should take risk ;-)

GATE Exam Day Strategy - 8 tips for you

• Read the question fully, word by word. Our eyes tend to skip some words and make us assume on our own.

• Check all the options after solving the questions, even you got one option correct.

• If you have already come across the question, do not take it easy. The data may be different which again gives you a negative mark.

• Give special care to 'NOT', 'FALSE', etc, in the question statement. We sometimes assume positively answer accordingly.

• The used formula should thoroughly be checked.

• No need of attempting the first few questions in rush. The first thing always takes time. So, take time to get set.

• Do not answer the question if you are partially clear about its concept. Half knowledge is dangerous!

• MOST IMPORTANT! Attempt more mock tests, full-length tests, subjectwise tests and develop your own strategy.

The strategy may vary from person to person, but the motto should be the same, so the end result. In our very first episode of APSEd Talks, we got Prasanth V who is currently working at IOCL. He secured AIR 85 in GATE. Would you not love to hear his strategy behind his great success?

You can go through various articles for GATE strategy and plans curated by our experts.

1. Score 50 marks for sure in GATE 2021

2. 60 to 75+ marks in GATE 2021

3. Get a top 100 rank in GATE 2021

Let me know by commenting what is your strategy for skipping questions in GATE 2021.

That's all for this. See you soon in the next article!

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