IIT Kanpur alumnus Aditya Srivastava secured the top rank in the UPSC Civil Services Examination 2023. Before embarking on his UPSC journey, Srivastava was employed at Goldman Sachs in Bengaluru and was drawing a hefty monthly salary of ₹2.5 lakhs. Following the announcement of the results by the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) on April 16, a mock test attempted by Srivastava gained traction across social media platforms.

According to the mock test, Srivastava attempted the second question: “A mind all logic is like a knife all blade, it makes the hand bleed that uses it.”He begins his essay with a reference to Oppenheimer's idea of the Manhattan Project and discusses the balance between logic and emotion.

He wrote, “In the 1940s, the World War II was at its peak. During such challenging times, a country and specifically one person, had the ‘brilliant’ idea of the Manhattan Project. The ensuing devastation of Hiroshima and Nagasaki made the bigoted brilliance an agent of doom. That man was Oppenheimer and his brilliance of logical exposition had created a void so deep for USA, it can’t be filled by putting the Burj Khalifa in it!”