CAT Exam-Common Admission Test

 CAT Exam

CAT is known as Common Admission Test organised by Indian Institute of Management. It is common test which examines a persons Quantitative abilities, Data interpretation, verbal abilities and logical reasonings. CAT is definitely one of the toughest examination after IIT-JEE and other UPSC based engineering examinations. These exams are conducted for selecting candidates for business administration fields. CAT - The Common Admission Test to the six IIMs is also the entrance test for few other top B-Schools such as SP Jain, MICA, and T A Pai.

Five broad areas of exams are:-

1.    Verbal ability and reasoning
2.    Reading Comprehension
3.    Quantitative skills
4.    Data Interpretation
5.    Analytical and Logical reasoning.

CAT ELIGIBILITY CRITERIA

The candidate must hold a Bachelor’s Degree, with at least 50 per cent marks or equivalent CGPA [45 per cent in case of the candidates belonging to Scheduled Caste (SC), Scheduled Tribe (ST) category and Differently Abled (DA) categories, awarded by any of the Universities incorporated by an act of the central or state legislatures in India or other educational institutions established by an act of Parliament or declared to be deemed as a University under Section 3 of the UGC Act, 1956, or possess an equivalent qualification recognized by the Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India.

The percentage of marks obtained by the candidate in the bachelor’s degree would be calculated based on the practice followed by the university/institution from where the candidate has obtained the degree. 

In case the candidates are awarded grades/CGPA in place of marks, the conversion of grades/CGPA to percentage of marks would be based on the procedure certified by the university/ institution from where they are obtaining the bachelor's degree. In case the university/ institution does not have any scheme for converting CGPA into equivalent marks, dividing the candidate’s CGPA by the maximum possible CGPA and multiplying the result with 100 would establish the equivalence. 

Candidates appearing for the final year of bachelor’s degree / equivalent qualification examination and those who have completed degree requirements and are awaiting results can also apply for admission through CAT.

RESERVATIONS

Government of India has decided up to 15% seat reserved for SC and 7 1/2 for ST candidates. 27% seats are fixed for OBC. 

For getting more detailed information log onto the website http://www.ncbc.nic.in. NC-OBC category castes in central list can login to http://www.ncbc.nic.in/Centrallistobc.html.
As per Government of India act as on 19,2012 will be entertained (last day of registration). Besides this, 3% is reserved for physically handicapped students. Disability is of three categories:  low-vision/blindness, hearing impairment, and locomotors disability/cerebral palsy. There will be no changes after the closure of registration.

A candidate belonging to SC/ST as stated by Government of India nominations caste certificate should be issued in Government approved format clearly stating Name of caste/tribe, whether you belong to Scheduled Caste or Scheduled Tribe; District and the State or Union Territory of your normal residence; and the appropriate Government of India schedule under which your caste/tribe is approved by it as Scheduled Caste or Scheduled Tribe.

EXAM PATTERN FOR CAT EXAM

The test comprised OF 90 questions, divided into 3 sections in the year 2005. Typically this test can be expected to comprise between 75 to 150 objective type questions and usually divided into three to four sections. Each question has a statement followed by four alternate answer choices and the candidate has to choose the best answer for each of the questions and mark it on a special Optical Reader answer sheet.

Over these years, the number of questions being asked in CAT has been decreasing steadily. While the early 90s witnessed 180 to 200 questions, the late 90s, specifically CAT 1999 and CAT 2000 had 165 questions each. CAT 2001, CAT 2002 and CAT 2003 had only 150 questions each and these 150 questions were divided into three sections of 50 questions each. There were 123 questions in CAT 2004 and only 90 in CAT 2005. CAT 2004 and CAT 2005 both had differential marks to questions. There were 0.5 marks, 1 mark and 2 marks questions.

The duration of the test is of 120 minutes. This literally translates to answering a CAT question in 48 seconds. Most successful aspirants do not attempt anything more than 120 plus questions. And quite a lot of them attempt between 70 and 90 marks worth of questions. 

APPLICATION PROCEDURE:

The candidates have to first wait for the CAT Exam 2012 notifications, which generally comes out in the last Sunday of August every year. It will give you the list of the important dates, way to buy the CAT Voucher and other necessary details. You should then buy the CAT voucher. Registration should be done online in www.catiim.in. Candidates must have a valid email account as IIMs will do all the communications only through email id.