Dairy Technology-Dairy Engineering: ICAR PG entrance preparation tips

Indian Council of Agriculture Research (ICAR), an autonomous body under the Ministry of Agriculture, Government of India, conducts an All India PG Entrance examination annually for entry into post-graduation of Agriculture and allied disciplines viz., Veterinary, Dairy, Fisheries, Food Technology etc. in 20 major subjects. This entrance examination is meant to fill up 100% PG seats at CIFE (Central Institute of Fisheries Education, Mumbai), IARI (Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi), IVRI (Indian Veterinary Research Institute, Izatnagar) and NDRI (National Dairy Research Institute, Karnal) and 15% seats in 5 CUs (Central Universities), 1 deemed-to-be-university and 56 SAUs (State Agriculture Universities).

The notification is issued in the month of December every year and the exam is conducted in the month of April (usually 2^nd or 3^rd Sunday) of the next calendar year at 49 test centers spanning India. It is a pen-and-paper based test wherein 160 questions (150 MCQs + 10 matching questions) have to be answered within 120 minutes. Results are declared in the 2^nd/3^rd week of May. The counselling is usually offline and centralized. It is conducted during June end/early July over a period of 9-10 days for all the major subjects at NASC complex, ICAR, New Delhi only.

This discussion will be only about Dairy Technology.

Major Subject 18: Dairy Technology

Approximately 350+ candidates take up Dairy Technology as their major subject every year. It comprises Dairy Technology and Dairy Engineering. A very conservative student to seat ratio is approximately 1:10. That’s a helluva competition, isn’t it?

Syllabus: The syllabus is classified into 3 units:

UNIT-I: Principles and processes of food preservation, non-conventional sources, processing of fluid milk, Computerization and Automatic Process Controls in Milk Processing. HACCP Concepts in Fluid Milk Processing. Advances in Centrifugal Separation and Bactofugation. Manufacture of various types of dairy products and changes occurring during manufacture and storage and their defects. Sensory evaluation and judging of milk and milk products, types of packaging materials and their properties, packing forms and operations, problems in food packaging, recent advances in packaging dairy and food products. Intelligent Food Packaging. Nutritional Labeling of Food Products. Application of Membrane Processing in Milk Processing.

UNIT-II: Materials and sanitary features of the dairy equipment. Homogenizer- Theory of Homogenization. Triplex pump, Lubrication of the Homogenizer, care and Management of homogenizer, Homogenizer Accessories and Standards for Homogenizer. Pasteurizer- Pasteurizer construction & Principle Materials used in Construction of Pasteurizers. High temperature short time Pasteurizer, care of Pasteurizer, Reaction Kinetics, Sterilizer, Mixing & agitation equipment, principles of evaporation, drying. Atmosphere concentration, Vacuum Pan, Fluidization. Care of Vacuum Pan, Atmospheric Drum Dryer. Spray Dryer principles of dairy plant layout and design, Functional Design, space requirement of Milk Plant, problem through computers, centralized dispersal of data processing, d-BASE-III, Lotus 1-2-3 to graphics, Fortran.

UNIT-III: Fluid mechanics- properties of fluids, Bernoulli’s equation and its applications, hydraulic systems Types of Pumps, Sanitary pumps, Standards for Centrifugal and Positive Rotatory Type of pumps, Selection of Pumps. Care and Upkeep of Pumps dimensional analysis, refrigeration and air-conditioning. Artificial Refrigeration, Compression Refrigeration System, Refrigeration Accessories. Calculation of size of Refrigeration Machine Requirements. Heat-transfer and thermodynamics; mechanical separations, Rittinger’s and Kick’s laws, Engineering of mechanics, theory of machine, strength of materials, Hook’s law, materials of fabrications, machine tools, Electrical Engg., Electromagnetic induction, Magnetic- Hysteresis loop (BH Curve), AC fundamentals.

Test Pattern:

The question paper will have 1:1 ratio of questions from Dairy Technology and Dairy Engineering, although the syllabus for Dairy Engineering seems to be loaded. The paper is so designed as to test candidates’ basic concepts and strength of fundamentals with leverage on principle application, problem solving and logical ability. There will be hardly any questions that’d test your quantitative skills- so if math isn’t your cup of tea, chillax! There’s no rule of minimum-cut-off and all questions will be mixed. So, nothing like feeling terrible of.

Scoring system:

Every correct response to the 150-odd-MCQs would fetch you 4 marks, but every wrong answer would annihilate your overall score by -1. Each matching question (total 10no.s) is worth 5 marks and a wrong response would cost you -0.2 of your overall score. This indicates, negative marking is helluva costly. The maximum marks that can be scored is 650.

Syllabus analysis:

Dairy Technology

The questions would be very basic. So, be really careful of your fundamentals. Important topics are:

Packaging of Dairy Products – properties of packaging materials suiting the needs of various products, MAP of milk powders

Defects of various milk and milk products

Time-Temperature combinations for all products – indicator micro-organisms, objectives, percentage destruction of nutrients during various treatments, shelf life extension

Market milk basics – reception, RMRD equipment, storage, chilling

Fat rich dairy products – Fat constants, specifications for cholesterol content, common adulterants and tests for detection, PFA and AGMARK standards, Auto-oxidation and granularity in ghee, butter manufacture – temperatures at various stages and percentage of various additives

Product moisture and yield calculations – this was asked in 2013 question paper

FSSA specifications for all products

Ice-Cream and Froze Desserts: Drawing temperatures, over-run, composition and physico-chemical properties

Condensed & Dried milks: Temperatures & various operating parameters, defects in Condensed milks, Roller drying vs. Spray Drying, Physico-chemical properties of Powders, WPN index, Classification of powders etc.

Questions from sensory evaluation, nutritional labeling of food products, advances in cream separation and Bactofugation are rarely covered.  

Dairy Engineering

This portion of the paper is a bit trickier. Most of the questions can be answered very easily, but a select few require application of logic too! This is where the ranks get decided. Nevertheless, the important topics are:

HTST Pasteurizer : plate distance, space requirement, steam requirement, regeneration efficiency calculation, FDV operation etc.

Homogenization & Cream separations: Disc spacing and angle, rpms of various centrifugal members, important equations and relationships

Evaporation & Drying : Vacuum in various stages, types of evaporators and the overall heat transfer co-efficient (U) values, principles of drying, cyclone separators, velocities of air, air-dried particles mixture, inlet-outlet temperatures etc.

Electric Engineering : Star connection, Delta Connection, AC fundamentals, Crest factor, Peak factor, Equivalent resistance and Equivalent capacitance

Thermodynamics & Heat Transfer : Conduction, Convection and radiation- laws governing them, SI units of all parameters, Co-current vs. Counter current, LMTD, thermodynamic laws, Pressure and temperature conversions and values, STP, NTP, Prandtl No., Nusslet No., Stanton No., Peclet No., Gretz No., Grasshoff No.

Refrigeration Engineering : Types of compressors, parts, evaporation and condensing temperatures and pressures, Psychrometric basics: RH, SH, dew point temperature etc.

Hydraulics : Bernoulli’s principle and applications, pumps and its performance ratios, dimensionless constants- Reynold No., Froude No., Weber No., Euler No., Mach No., etc.

Kick’s law, FC Bond’s Law, Rittinger’s law

Questions related to Functional Design, problem through computers, centralized dispersal of data processing, d-BASE-III, Lotus 1-2-3 to graphics, Fortran, Magnetic- Hysteresis loop (BH Curve) don’t usually appear in the exam.

Test Taking strategy:

1. Mark all the questions which you think you haven’t had even a remote idea about, while doing so.
2. After this initial review, start answering the questions one-by-one.
3. Digest the contents of the questions perfectly. Don’t assume or presume anything.
4. After the first round of answering the questions, mark all those answers in the OMR sheet which you’re 100% sure about, at once. Don’t delay the answer marking for the end.
5. In the second round, look at the questions where you have to apply logic- these are trickier- so exercise maximum caution. Once you’re sure, mark them in the OMR sheet accordingly.
6. In the third round, try solving the most difficult ones- try collating the contents with other related questions and try to arrive logically at the right answer by eliminating the unrelated options. 
7. Re-check all the answers of second & third round- guesstimation doesn’t always work! So be really careful-remember!! Negative marking is costly.
8. Don’t believe in rumors like attempting 120+ questions correctly will fetch you a rank in Top-5. Believe in your preparation and attempt accordingly.
9. Most of the time, 2-3 questions get repeated. This is a blessing in disguise, isn’t it? Answer such questions.
10. To some questions, the answers are hidden in the match the following section. Look out for such possibilities
11. Don’t be under the false notion that mugging-up Sukumar De and Tufail Ahmad will help you. Leverage on e-courses for new and better information. 2013 paper had many questions directly picked up from behind e-courses.
12. Try to remember the questions that seemed entirely new and try finding out answers for those.

I wish all the test-takers ALL THE BEST. Go, perform well and grab the opportunity to study at the best Universities in India.

Comments, queries and suggestions are most welcome.

(The blogger was #1 in ICAR PG- 2013 in DT-DE and is presently pursuing M.Sc. (Food Technology) at the prestigious CSIR-CFTRI, Mysore)