The topper among SC candidates also hails from Tiruchi district.
Scoring a double with a cut-off of 200 in both medical and engineering, R.Gowtham, who topped the MBBS rank list, has secured the third rank in the TNEA list. Another city boy N.Saravanan, also with a cut-off of 200, has been ranked sixth in the TNEA.
Among the communal rankings, S.Sabhari Haran of Madhurapuri in Thuraiyur, about 45 km from here, has emerged the topper among SC candidates with a cut-off of 199.75. He stood 34 in the overall rank list. Gowtham and Sabhari Haran are opting for medicine.
Being products of schools in Namakkal district is a common denominator among the three boys. All three had switched over to the schools there after SSLC.
Becoming a cardiologist lies at the heart of Gowtham, though he claimed to have had an open mind until the rank lists were out. A student of SKV Higher Secondary School, he had scored centum in Physics, Chemistry, Biology and Mathematics with an overall tally of 1,180 marks in Plus Two. “I did not strain too much for the TNEA and studied normally,” he said.
For Sabhari Haran, his father G.Sivakumar, chief civil surgeon in anaesthesia at Perambalur Government Hospital, is an obvious inspiration. His elder brother is a final-year medical student at Madurai Medical College too.
A student of SRV Boys Higher Secondary School, Rasipuram, Sabhari Haran had secured the third position in the communal rankings in the medical list and hopes to make it to Madras Medical College. He too has set sights on specialising in cardiology. In Plus Two, he had secured centum in Biology, Mathematics and Physics and 199 in Chemistry in an overall score of 1,178. “Apart from the training at the schools, my mother was at hand for guidance,” he said. His mother, Surekha Devi, a home maker, had moved over to Namakkal to be at his side during his Plus Two study.
Becoming a computer science engineer has been a childhood ambition of Saravanan, who is now well on course to achieve the same. “I had always wanted to become a computer science engineer and study at Anna University, Chennai,” said Saravanan, a student of Green Park Matriculation Higher Secondary School, Namakkal. He had scored 1,183 marks in Plus Two with centum in Physics, Chemistry, Computer Science and Mathematics.
Son of S.Nakeeeran, an assistant in TNEB Cooperative Society, and N.Chithra, who runs a textile shop in the city, Saravanan said he had spent five hours every day for intensive preparation in the run up to the Plus Two exams. Though he attended a coaching programme for AIEEE exam in a private institute, he did not go in for separate coaching for TNEA. He was ranked 1,527 in the AIEEE state list and had got admission to an institution in the north in the first round of counselling. But his preferred choice is Anna University.
