The 16-year-old picked up 13 A* GCSE grades at Bradford Grammar School yesterday making him the most successful pupil the school has ever had.

His top marks were achieved in maths, statistics, English literature, English language, biology, physics, chemistry, history, religious studies, Urdu, art, Latin and German.

The pupil from Nab Wood, near Shipley, told the Yorkshire Post he was delighted and stunned by his GCSE success.

He said: "I was really surprised, especially with my marks in subjects like art and English but I feel like all the hard work has paid off."

The demands of studying for 13 different exams meant that Nabeel sat his religious studies lessons on a lunchtime outside the school's timetable.

He now plans to stay at Bradford Grammar School to study A-levels before going onto university where he wants to pursue economics.

Bradford Grammar School's headmaster Stephen Davidson paid tribute to Nabeel and the rest of his year 11 classmates for their exam success.

He said: "The average score for students here this year is just under 10 As, It is an extraordinary achievement.

"Gone are the days when someone like myself could fly by the seat of my pants and turn up for my O-level – which were more a test of memory than of knowledge and get by.

"This generation of young people work harder for their results than any other generation before them . People will say the exams get easier but let them come here and see the amount of hard work that these young people do.

"Another thing that we get thrown at us is that we should do well because we are a grammar school. I would say we are one of the most socially diverse schools in West Yorkshire because of our bursary scheme which allows to teach students like Nabeel, who otherwise would not be able to afford to be here.

"Nabeel's achievement is amazing. He studied for religious studies off timetable which is not something we encourage but when a student shows an interest in a subject it is something we can facilitate."

Across Yorkshire students were celebrating outstanding successes. Leeds Girls' High School saw Laura Ayres, Jordan Harries, Jessica Kearney, Georgia Lynott , Pooja Menon, Claire Rogers, and Anya Sheltaway achieve nine straight A* passes, while Louise Widdowson picked up 10 A*s.

Leeds Grammar School, which will merge with the girls' high school next month, also saw a group of students achieve straight A*s with Haydon Davidson, Alistair Finerty, Thomas Machugh, Jonathan Tan, Alex Watson and Dominic Wrench each achieving 10 top grades.

North Yorkshire's top performing state schools have seen their results pushed even higher this year St Aidan's CE High School has seen its overall five A*-C pass rate rise to 97.1 per cent from 94.5 per cent and from 85.8 to 91.3 per cent including English and Maths. More than half its students achieved straight A* and A grades.

Ermysted's and Ripon Grammar Schools pushed their overall pass rate up to 100 and 99.2 per cent respectively and their pass rate including English and Maths to 98 per cent and 98.4 per cent. Ripon's headteacher Martin Pearman said: "They are our best GCSE results ever. There was the highest percentage of A* and A grades at 61.04 per cent and 42 students gained a minimum of 10 A* or A grades."