pchangr

I would speculate that it’s more about Israel interests. Iran produces 5% of the global oil but more importantly, it represents 20% of their gov income and the major engine of economic growth in the country. So .. you control their oil, you control the government.. and with it, the major antagonist to us interests in the region. Every other country in the region is aligned with the US or just too poor to be relevant. So it’d be a big win for the global geopolitics board.

I should have clarified that I was defining selectivity as the ratio between applicants and accepted candidates. Getting in this school requires someone to be among the top 250k takers of a specific exam (JEE main) typically, it’d be taken by around 1.5 million students. If one is among those 250k, one can choose to do the advanced test.. which in 2025 was cleared by 56 880 students .. from which, 18,188 students were admitted.

And yes, if you have more than .. 84 candidates, your process would be more selective. However, I think the fair comparison would be .. say .. the MIT?

On the same year, the MIT got 29,282 applications and admitted 1,324 students

So if you apply to the MIT you’re more than 3 times likelier to get accepted.

I think it’s good for people outside of India (myself included) to know how competitive life is over there. Indian research institutes seem to be truly top notch and they deserve due respect. That was my reason to share.

I just thought it was a cool fact :)

I believe this is how most publicly funded research and some private research institutes work. This research was conducted by a public Indian university (IIT Madras). Which, by the way is literally more selective than IVY league universities

I’d argue that most residents would likely have access to better offers locally. As for the age limit, I think it just lets you get a cheaper inter-rail, which is subsidized by the DiscoverEU. AFAIK, you can always buy a full interrail pass for all countries. And yes, non eu people can buy eurail.: but that one is much more expensive than the equivalent interrail, I think. Maybe I’m wrong about the last one tho

I guess it depends on what you expect. If you expect the train to be on time .. yes, India is much better than Germany. ~80% trains delayed 15 min or less vs Germany 36% trains delayed 15 min or less. It can get pretty bad when your train is delayed so you miss your connection and now you’re stranded in a random town waiting for the next train .. which is coming .. at 5am the next day. Or you can take the regional and hopefully make it in 12 hours with 3 connections instead of your original 4 hour leg. :D

If you expect a comfortable and quiet experience, then I’d agree with you, Germany can be a much nicer experience.

So it’s really about what you value, I guess

Interrail is sometimes cheaper, specially as a student. Otherwise it’s usually still cheaper if you want to go to multiple stops

OMG.. are we really doing this? T_T It’s just the marketing term….

“Interrail One Country Pass allows unlimited rail travel within one participating country, excluding the holder’s country of residence.”

It’s a way of reinforcing eu identity.. they call it interrail because it connects you to other cultures or societies or whatever you want to call it

Not all countries have a rail pass and not all countries offer a 100% discount pass. And even less offer a 100% discount on all trains and for non residents

TIL mm:hh is a thing o_O