The Hindu : Front Page : CAT springs no surprises this year

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Monday, Nov 19, 2007
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CAT springs no surprises this year

Staff Reporter

About 20,000 students took the test in Bangalore
Negative marking makes things tough for aspirants

— Photo: K. Murali Kumar

belling the cat: Candidates who appeared for Common Admission Test at one of the centres in Bangalore on Sunday.

Bangalore: Aspirants to India’s most reputed management schools can finally heave a sigh of relief. The Common Admission Test 2007 (CAT) went off smoothly with nearly 2.3 lakh students — 50,000 more than last year — writing the examination across the country. Students were happy that there were no changes or surprises in the examination structure and pattern.

About 20,000 students from Karnataka appeared in 20 centres across the city for what is acknowledged as India’s toughest management examination.

Unlike last year, when the CAT sprung a surprise on students by extending the duration of the exam and changing the pattern of questions, there were no changes this year. “The questions seemed easy at first glance but they were a lot tougher to crack,” said Vivek K., a software engineer. He said that he had predicted it would get tougher since the number of questions had been reduced from 90 to 75 last year.

Margins in this test are narrow and the negative marking does not make things easier. “The multiple-choice answers were really close, and accuracy might go for a toss,” said Ajay Arora, Regional Director, TIME, Bangalore. Websites of several coaching centres have already published the detailed analysis with anticipated cut-offs for the benefit of students.

The CAT has always been an examination from which students emerge uncertain about where they stand, because it employs a process of differential marking. Students are competing for the 1,600 seats on offer in the seven Indian Institutes of Management in Ahmedabad, Kolkata, Bangalore, Kozhikode, Lucknow, Indore and Shillong.

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