Tuesday, March 2, 2010

The CATastrophe


Finally the much awaited CAT (Common Admission Test for IIMs) results are out. Certainly it should bring sigh of relief to more than 2.4 lac students who appeared for CAT. But it has failed to do so. Most of the candidates are unhappy due to results. CAT results are faulty and full of technical glitches.

For the first time IIMs conducted online CAT. Initially it was supposed to be conducted from 28th November, 2009 to 7th December, 2009 with two slots in each day. But due to huge malfunction and loopholes the examination process was finally over on 31st January, 2010. Meanwhile a techie in Bangalore filed a PIL at High Court against CAT committee. Here are some allegations below:
  • Questions were repeated from previous CAT papers
  • Hell & heaven difference in difficulty level of CAT papers across slots
  • Huge technical fault to conduct the computerized test
  • Questions leakage on internet,etc

All these things made CAT-2009 a management case study. The IIM teach solution to various management cases to its students. But this time the best B-Schools in the country have established a great example of mismanagement. 

The entire CAT-2009 episode starting from examination to results is nothing but a big joke. As far as CAT results are concerned following points are very crucial:

  • There was no proper date of announcement of results. It was postponed several times. Perhaps IIMs knew that they had screwed it up.
  • The marking pattern was not disclosed.
  • Psychometric evaluation cannot standardize so many factors as stated above.
  • Scores were given out of 450 with 150 as full marks for each sections. Everybody has scored in round figures. There are numerous cases where the marks obtained is a mystery.

It is a matter of shame not only for the IIMs but for the entire country. The best management institutes cannot even properly conduct an online entrance examination. 

-Arnab Mandal
  Durgapur





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