Yash Tanwar was recommended through the Coast Guard entry for the January 2027 course in his 10th SSB attempt. His selection was through the Coast Guard Selection Board (GSB), Noida.
Yash is from Durghsattitabad and completed both his schooling and college from Durghundi. He is currently pursuing an M.Sc. in Computer Science. Alongside his studies, he has also been preparing for and clearing written examinations while shouldering responsibilities at home.
His motivation to join the Armed Forces comes from both internal and external factors. Internally, he wanted to become the first-generation officer from his family. Externally, someone from his extended family had been recommended through the TES entry, which sparked the thought in him that if someone else could achieve it, he could too.
Yash’s journey with R2R changed his perspective on how to approach the psychology and interview stages of SSB. He learned to relate his real self to the stimuli given in the psychological tests and became more confident in approaching the interview. During his preparation, he worked with Neha Ma’am for psychology and Rahul Sir for the interview, where he learned how to relate his life experiences, decisions and personality to the OLQs while remaining genuine and authentic.
Although this was Yash’s 10th attempt, it was only his second conference. Before this, he had been screened out eight times, making his eventual recommendation a result of repeatedly working through his setbacks. In this attempt, he kept his psychology responses simple and natural. For the TAT, he focused on writing straightforward stories based on the pictures rather than trying to force elaborate or artificial narratives. He felt that the TAT went well, as the pictures were largely neutral or showed direct-action situations.
The interview was another important factor in his recommendation. Yash had prepared by understanding how to connect the OLQs with his own personality, life decisions and experiences. During the actual interview, he was questioned extensively about his general knowledge, previous attempts, his 12th-grade performance, his decisions after 12th, and his gap year after graduation. Although he could not answer many of the general knowledge questions, he was able to answer the arithmetic and mathematical questions correctly. He believes that being honest about his experiences and not trying to fabricate answers played a major role in his recommendation.
Yash believes that honesty and naturalness were among the biggest factors that worked in his favour. His journey had involved several setbacks, including repeated screening-outs and a medical issue related to substandard colour perception, for which he is still expected to appear before the AMB. However, he did not allow these setbacks to define his journey. He continued appearing for examinations, taking responsibility at home, improving with every attempt, and trusting the process.
His biggest message to aspirants is not to get demotivated by setbacks. He believes candidates should learn from their mistakes, trust the process and continuously work on improving with every attempt. He also advises aspirants not to become desperate about SSB. According to him, setbacks, including medical issues or repeated unsuccessful attempts, do not necessarily mean that the journey has ended. He was also reminded by a Commandant during document verification that SSB is a simple process and that, after having appeared multiple times, he should simply remain honest, natural and confident in the process. Yash followed this approach in his successful attempt and ultimately earned his recommendation.
