Raghav Bhartia helps his mother in the kitchen. Picture by Mayukh Sengupta

He is a fan of Akshay Kumar but he has proved to be a Khiladiyon ka Khiladi on a different turf. Raghav Bhartia of CB 166 is reportedly the city topper in this year’s CBSE Class XII finals.

The Bhartiya Vidya Bhavan student has scored 97.8 per cent. Ask him what his score was in the pre-board exams and he shrugs off the query with a cryptic “Average”. The figure, on prodding, turns out to be 80 per cent. From there to a marksheet-topping total is indeed making a leap from Chandni Chowk to China within a matter of months.

He admits his parents were a bit concerned about his initial score. He used to top his classes till Class X but had slipped from the top three at the Plus II stage. “I assured them I’d study hard.”

That he did. “Through January and February, I woke up at 8am and went to sleep at midnight.” But he did take breaks every now and then, watching TV or going on Facebook or Whatsapp.

He says he had no tutors. “My parents left it to me to decide whether I needed help or not. Board exams are easy. So I studied on my own.” He did start taking tuitions for the IIT-JEE entrance but left after a while.

He has scored full marks in mathematics and 98 in physics and cannot decide which to call his favourite between the two. Nor is he sure which stream to pursue now. “I am planning many things. I am open to careers in mathematics, economics and engineering. It all depends on which institutes I qualify for.” While he has taken the IIT-JEE admission test, he has also picked up forms for St. Stephen’s College in Delhi and St. Xavier’s College in Calcutta.

With ample time in hand, the 18-year-old is either surfing the Net for colleges or driving around in his father's Swift to prepare for the test to get his driving licence. Not one to watch or play cricket or football, the youngest of the three siblings is watching films the rest of the time. No prizes for guessing which films.