'It's Not in Our Hands': How This NEET Topper Stayed Focused Through Uncertainty

"Forget the bad marks, analyse your mistakes and focus on the next step," he says—a simple yet powerful mantra that carried him through months of preparation. His success story was among several celebrated as ALLEN Kolkata felicitated its top NEET achievers on Friday.

Top All India Rank holders (AIRs) associated with the educational institution ALLEN across West Bengal were felicitated and celebrated as the NEET-UG results rolled out on Thursday this week.

Toppers from all ALLEN’s various branches in Hazra, Barrackpore, Liluah, Durgapur, etc were invited to their flagship Chinar Park branch to get felicitated on Friday, a day after the National Testing Agency (NTA) released the results.

ALLEN Faculty and NEET-UG 2026 toppers in Kolkata. Photo: PR Team

The event hosted a number of toppers (including two who joined virtually), their parents, and a cohort of their own students who aspire to crack the exam in the near future. The felicitation included toppers discussing their experiences and a celebratory cake-cutting.

ALLEN Kolkata shared its results, with Aritra Kr Chakraborty receiving an All India Rank of 284, scoring 680 marks out of 720. Each topper was felicitated with a celebratory shawl and a gift. Other Kolkata toppers included Rajanya Dinda with an AIR-940 (640 marks), Sampurna Ghosh securing AIR-981 (649 marks), Anirban Dutta AIR-1404 (650 marks), and Nandani Mal securing AIR-1532 (649 marks).

Reflecting on how Aritra managed his mental health during preparation,  he told IBNS, “Mental well-being plays an important role throughout the journey. When we receive lower marks, we really feel demotivated. However, we should forget about it, analyse our mistakes, and focus on the next part.”

When asked how concerns over the examination process integrity affected his preparation, Chakraborty said he chooses to focus on what is in his control, which is his preparation.

“It’s not in our hands; what’s in our hands is that we can prepare our best. When NEET got cancelled, I really felt demotivated. But I realised what I can do is prepare better and achieve a better rank.”

Advising future NEET aspirants, he said, “Follow your teachers, be consistent, analyse your mistakes and appear for tests regularly.”

Nationally, the institution secured AIR ranks 1 (Mr. Aryan Gupta), 2 (Panshul Bansal), 4 (Ayush Bhalotia), 7 (Aryan Dubey), and 9 (Gaurav Singh), securing 5 out of the top 10 spots in the list.

Allen Career Institute has nationally produced 44 AIR holders in the top 100 category. Out of these 44 AIR holders, 36 were classroom students, while 8 were from the Distance Learning Program and online test series. Sixty out of 138 students who scored above 690 in the medical entrance, according to the list released by the NTA, are associated with the institution

Conducted by the National Testing Agency (NTA), NEET is the single largest medical entrance examination conducted in the nation for undergraduate medical admissions in the country’s most prestigious medical schools.

Over 24.1 lakh students appeared for the exam, competing for around 1.29 lakh  MBBS seats across colleges in India, with the addition of BDS (Bachelor in Dental Surgery), AYUSH (Ayurveda, Yoga & Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha, and Homeopathy) and veterinary courses increasing the seat count to around 2.1 lakh.

With the examination remaining one of the most competitive entrance tests in the world, the felicitation underscored the efforts of students who successfully navigated months of rigorous preparation to secure top ranks.

(Reporting by Swastik Sarkar)