Common Admission Test (CAT)

General Description:

If it’s MBA, it got to be from IIM. The Common Admission Test is definitely the most popular entrance exam to B schools in India. This online exam is your first step towards the coveted Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs), and is an absolute must for anyone who’s serious about doing an MBA in India.

Accepting Institutes:

Since the CAT is conducted by the IIMs, naturally all of them accept CAT scores. But these scores are also accepted by a host of other institutes in the country. Some of the more popular B Schools accepting CAT scores are:

• Department of Management Studies - IIT Delhi
• Shailesh J Mehta School of Management - IIT Bombay
• Vinod Gupta School of Management - IIT Kharagpur
• MDI, Gurgaon
• SP Jain Institute of Management and Research, Mumbai
• IMT, Ghaziabad
• Jamnalal Bajaj Institute of Management Studies (JBIMS)
• Mudra Institute of Communications, Ahmedabad (MICA)
• National Institute of Industrial Engineering (NITIE), Mumbai
• Wellingkar Institute of Management Development and Research, Mumbai
• Indian Institute of Science (IISc)

[ Previously students had to give Joint Management Entrance Test (JMET) to get into the above institutes, but now JMET has been scrapped and now they accept CAT scores for admission ]

Eligibility and Syllabus:

The candidate must hold a Bachelor’s Degree, with at least 50% marks

Here is the complete CAT Syllabus.

Dates:

The CAT is held over a roughly 20-day period between mid-October and mid-November. There are two slots on each day. Of course, each paper is different.

Format and Peculiarities:

The CAT format has been completely revamped, with effect from the year 2011.

Now, there will be two sections instead of three –

Thus the entire test lasts for 140 minutes and has a total of 60 questions, but remember that you CANNOT carry forward time from the first section to the next.

Before beginning of the test, there will be a 15-minute optional tutorial to familiarise candidates with navigation and functionality available during the test. Its highly recommended for Candidates to go through tutorial.

Tips:

The most important thing to bear in mind is that CAT is more a test of your nerves than your skill/aptitude. Keeping cool even under pressure is what ultimately separates those who crack the CAT from those who don’t. Of course, that doesn’t mean that studying isn’t important. Get your concepts right and practice diligently. Regularity is absolutely essential.

To tackle the new pattern, time management is even more important now than it formerly was. Make sure you’re very comfortable with (and pretty quick in) both sections, as you need to score well in each.

If you can do all the above, you should be fine.