Parag always liked computers and cars; maths was his forte, say parents – Times of India
MUMBAI: Going by trending searches, almost everyone has been furiously googling Parag Agrawal’s IIT-JEE rank (77), his salary ($1million) and the name of his wife (Vineeta). But his IIT mates have several more nuggets to share about the new Twitter CEO. After entering the hallowed gates of IIT Bom…….
MUMBAI: Going by trending searches, almost everyone has been furiously googling Parag Agrawal’s IIT-JEE rank (77), his salary ($1million) and the name of his wife (Vineeta). But his IIT mates have several more nuggets to share about the new Twitter CEO. After entering the hallowed gates of IIT Bombay, he made his mark at Freshtech, an exam which is an open challenge to all freshies. Out of 480, just some 25% of “bravehearts” came forward to take the TechGC.
“Ordinary people like us could not solve a single question; it was tough. But when they announced the results, Parag had tied at second place,” said Devendra Kumar Agrawal, who also joined IITB in 2001 but in the electrical engineering department. “I recall Parag as being cool, friendly, and brilliant,” said the founder of Dexter Capital.
His hostel mates shared their recollections as well. “The first year of IITB is an interesting one. Everyone is trying to find their feet as locally everyone is a hero of their town or coaching class but he scored a 10/10 after the first year and established himself as the smartest person around,” said Ram Kakkad, who was from the same hostel 4 of the Powai campus and is now head of the product division at Hypertrack, Seattle.
Describing him as a clear thinker, level-headed and helpful, Kakkad recalled how he accidentally bumped into Parag on the streets of New York in 2016 when Parag was shuttling between New York and San Francisco. “We had a meal together and I spoke about my start-up and he spoke passionately about Twitter.”
A student of Atomic Energy Central School, school 4, Parag later joined the Atomic Energy Junior College. His teachers remember him as a front-bencher who was innovative in his thinking. “His teachers Omita Mandal and Smita Bobhate rated his problem-solving skills and thinking ability to be the highest in the class,” said principal Anand Kumar. He was felicitated for scoring high marks in class XII exams and for bagging the gold medal in the International Physics Olympiad.
Parag’s father, Ram Gopal Agrawal, 72, who retired from the Refuelling Technology Division of BARC in 2011, said that mathematics had been his forte right from his childhood. “He was always interested in computers and cars. Whenever we travelled, he invariably picked magazines and literature on these subjects,” said his mother, Shashi (67). His mother took voluntary retirement from VJTI (where she was a professor for economics and management), to spend time with the family. Parag’s sister, Kunal, is faculty at the Washington University. The parents currently live in Thane.
While Parag always did well in studies, he surprised them by becoming one of the top 10 rankers in the state …….
