Need some suggestion for preparation GATE-2015

Hi everyone,

I am a working professional in an Healthcare IT products company. I have completed my B.E in ECE and choose to start my career in Computers as it is my passion. Nearly 1 and a half year for now in the startup world and I am blessed to start working closely with the CTO of the company in assisting him in the R & D of the product which is being designed.

He is an Ph.D Mathematician and designs algorithms for solving big data problems mathematically. He made me understand the physical significance of the Math that we have learnt over years. It is kind of driving me towards studies again and I am wanting to do M.tech in Computer Science engineering in top IITs.
This was my dream when I was in engineering but I wanted to build aims and goals before starting to dream about it again. Now it seems like the right moment for me to set my basics straight and my experience has taught me what should be the perspective towards studies.

I am entrepreneurial and have worked on building a tech savvy startup along with my friends which ended up because of funding problems.
Having all these perspectives, I am willing to begin my journey towards higher studies to learn and come back with proper knowledge to solve the real life problems and build a startup on tech.

I am looking for some guidelines. I have read the discussions which had answers saying you dont have to quit your job to prepare for GATE. I have started my preparations on my own with Math as that is coinciding with my work assignments too.

Will I be able to cover the syllabus if I hold on to this job utilizing the weekends and sometime in the weekdays?

I called up a coaching institute and I was told that it would be difficult for me to write GATE CS paper as I am from EC background. Will that be a disadvantage?

I have quite an amount of basics on Computer Science as it is my passion always.

Welcome to CE, #-Link-Snipped-# . Good to have you with us. Thank you for describing the situation in detail. It makes it easier to offer suggestions. From your post, I think I can derive the following-

You have a few years of experience working for startups.
You are currently satisfied with your job.
Higher Studies are essential for you to pursue your dream, which is building a startup that requires you to have the knowledge.
You are concerned about time you can dedicated and want to know how difficult for you to take GATE (CS) given your background in ECE.

I think my advice is going to be a bit different than what you are asking. You are an entrepreneurial person and that means you are self-initiated. I also see that the 'PG' degree per se, won't help you in your career (you aren't looking for a job).

Your aim is clearly defined - which is to take up PG studies to gain knowledge to help your new startup. If that's the situation, my suggestion to you is to skip GATE and 2 years of studies and directly hop on to learning the subjects that matter to you. Save up on time and money in preparing for GATE, admission procedure and 2 years of studies that will keep you away from the ground zero.

Buy the course material or get it from library and embark on your studies. You should be able to complete your studies on your own much faster and without losing anything from what matters the most; which is your current startup.

Have you thought of it?