Sorry to hear this for you. Maybe GPA plays important than publications or vice versa or both. It all depends on review committee. I got my rejection today (NSERC-PDF). I have submitted 2 journals first author, 3 accepted co-author, 7 conf. referred first author 7 conf. co-author and 5 non-referred conf. I have 5 years research exp. before joining PhD.; Anyways my GPA is not great 3.53/4.3, probably thats my weak point. And after getting rejection letter I checked my reviewers profile. Except 1 reviewer all were out of the my research domain. Last year one of my colleague got NSERC PDF just based on one journal that too was accepted but he had 14 conf. to his credit (lucky guy because both husband wife work in same domain, lots of joint publications), and good GPA, and at the end got best PhD award. In same dept. there is a guy with 5 journals first author, 7 conf. and highest GPA, all univ. scholarship but no best PhD ... so its all luck !!!
I also know a friend of mine who was like your case but was pre-approved for IRDF. Its a big gambling where decision is based on many a priori parameters and controlled by many posteriori thresholds (reviewers etc).
Good luck for next time to you as well as to me. Hope next time we are selected. Felt disappointed !!!
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