JEE ADVANCED Results: The boy who quit YouTube Shorts is going to IIT Bombay, tops Chandigarh
JEE advanced result: Chandigarh’s Aarush Singhal ranks AIR 45 in JEE Advanced 2026, completing a sweep after his AIR 8 in JEE Main. Tricity places four students in national top 100 — Yajat Singhal AIR 21, Arnav Gandhi AIR 36, Aditya Gupta AIR 81
North Desk Correspondent
Chandigarh, June 2
The story began with a boy addicted to YouTube Shorts, his marks slipping, and a decision that most teenagers would find unthinkable: put the phone down. Not reduce screen time. Not set app limits. Put it down entirely.
That decision gave Aarush Singhal, 18, of Sector 37, Chandigarh, AIR 8 in JEE Main 2026 — a perfect 100 percentile, his name listed first among 26 flawless scorers in a field of 15 lakh candidates.
Now, it has given him something more. An All India Rank of 45 in JEE Advanced 2026. The sweep is complete. IIT Bombay’s computer science programme — his ambition since Class 4, when he first began competing in programming and web design contests — is no longer a goal. It is a destination.
The phone, the habit, and the decision
It was his coaching centre, Sri Chaitanya, that first sounded the alarm. The mock tests that had once gone smoothly began to show slippage. Marks were falling. The reason wasn’t hard to find.
“He had become sort of addicted to his mobile phone,” his mother Malti Singhal told North Desk earlier this year. “He was watching Shorts and similar content. Then he realised he would have to kick this habit to realise his dream.”
What followed was a clean break — no social media, no phone. In an era when students routinely cite YouTube lectures as indispensable, Aarush did without. “He only depended on the study material provided by his coaching centre,” Malti said. “They had prepared excellent material and he stuck to that.”
What replaced the scrolling was a preparation method that was, by Aarush’s own account, deliberately unhurried. No 12-hour grind sessions. Shorter, focused stretches of work, broken up with regular breaks. Basketball when the books needed to be set aside. Consistency over volume.
In January’s Session 1 of JEE Main, he scored 99.99 percentile. The April result — perfect score, AIR 8, name first on the NTA list — was confirmation, not surprise.
JEE advanced result: ‘Back to playing games on phone’
JEE advanced results: When North Desk spoke to Malti Singhal after the JEE Advanced result, the phone came up again — but the story had changed.
“He is now playing games, which he loved to do earlier. We can’t even stop him now,” she laughed.
But she was quick to add what matters: “One good thing is his self-control. He is also giving time to his studies so that he doesn’t get out of touch.”
The family is thrilled, she said. The result was as per expectation. Hardwork, consistency, and a never-give-up attitude — those are the reasons she points to.
And there may be a second chapter forming. Aarush’s younger brother is in Class 9. Coaching has already begun. “He wants to follow in his elder brother’s footsteps,” Malti said.
►How Aarush quit social media and topped JEE Main: Read the full story
What is JEE Advanced — and why does it matter more?
Most people have heard of JEE. Fewer understand that there are, in fact, two entirely different examinations — and the second one is significantly harder to even sit for.
JEE Main is the gateway. This year, 15,38,468 candidates appeared across both sessions — the largest field in the exam’s history. Of these, only 2,50,182 — roughly one in six — cleared the cutoff to qualify for JEE Advanced. The general category cutoff stood at 93.41 percentile. In other words, a student can score in the top seven percent of the country and still not make it to the Advanced exam.
JEE Advanced is conducted by the IITs themselves — this year by IIT Kanpur — and determines admission to the 23 Indian Institutes of Technology. It is widely regarded as one of the most demanding undergraduate entrance examinations in the world. The questions test not rote application but genuine conceptual depth. Many students who clear JEE Main choose not to attempt Advanced at all, or attempt it and do not qualify. To rank in the top 100 nationally is exceptional by any measure.
Aarush Singhal’s AIR 45 in JEE Advanced, after his AIR 8 in JEE Main, is a result that holds up at every level of scrutiny.
The tricity’s top-100 sweep
JEE advanced results: The Chandigarh tricity had a remarkable showing in JEE Advanced 2026, placing four students in the national top 100.
Yajat Singhal of Panchkula led the region with AIR 21 — topping not just the tricity but the entire state of Haryana. Arnav Gandhi, also of Panchkula, secured AIR 36. Like Aarush, Arnav is headed to IIT Bombay for computer science. His mantra through the preparation: stay consistent, avoid comparisons, and focus on improving every day. His parents, Dr Premdeep Gandhi and Dr Shikha Gandhi, are both dentists. Aditya Gupta of Chandigarh rounded out the four with AIR 81.
Taken together, it is the kind of result that a region points to for years.
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