Recruitment Stories - Ashraful's Experience at Pathao

Md Ashraful Alam, a graduate of BRAC University with a degree in Computer Science and Engineering, is currently working at Pathao as a Software Engineer Intern.

He first learned about Pathao’s AIM Internship 2026 program through a banner displayed on his university campus and decided to apply.

The recruitment process consisted of several phases:

Phase 1: CV/Resume Screening

More than 4,000 candidates applied for the program, and only 350 were shortlisted for the next round. According to Ashraful, participating in hackathons or competitive programming can significantly improve the chances of being shortlisted.

Phase 2: Aptitude Test

An aptitude test was conducted for the 350 shortlisted candidates. For preparation, he recommends practicing on platforms such as IndiaBix. He personally completed several practice tests before taking the assessment at Pathao.

Phase 3: Written Test

Approximately 45 candidates advanced to this round. The written test lasted one hour and included eight questions covering core Computer Science fundamentals, including:

• Basic concepts such as swapping two numbers without a third variable, HTTP vs HTTPS, and TCP vs UDP
• Data Structures concepts like FIFO vs LIFO with examples
• Recursion and time complexity analysis
• SQL queries based on given scenarios
• Two coding problems of LeetCode easy to medium difficulty, along with time and space complexity analysis

He mentioned that the coding problems carried the highest weight, accounting for around 20 marks.

Phase 4: Technical Interview

A total of 22 candidates were selected for the technical and HR interview rounds. The technical interview lasted around one hour and focused heavily on both theoretical fundamentals and practical understanding. Topics discussed included:

• Personal projects, including tech stack, architecture, and design decisions
• Object-Oriented Programming concepts and the four pillars of OOP
• Design patterns such as Singleton
• Database concepts, including scenario-based problem solving and ACID properties
• Computer Networks topics such as IP addressing and subnetting
• Problem-solving questions, including the “Two Sum” problem from LeetCode
• In-depth reasoning behind solutions, such as why a hashmap is used, how it works, and its time complexity
• REST APIs, Git, and GitHub

He noted that interviewers often followed up each answer with deeper conceptual questions to evaluate clarity of understanding. Strong fundamentals played a major role in succeeding in this round.

Phase 5: HR Interview

The HR interview was informal and conversational, without any intense questioning.

Note that Phases 3, 4, and 5 were conducted on the same day, requiring candidates to remain at the venue throughout the day.

Final Outcome

Out of the 22 candidates who reached the interview stage, only 7 were ultimately selected for the internship in the Engineering Department.

Special thanks to Md. Ashraful Alam for taking out the time to share his recruitment experience with me. If you have any queries, feel free to contact him at md.ashraful.alam223399@gmail.com