The Common Admission Test (CAT) 2016 was held in 138 across India on December 4 with as many as 1.95 lakh candidates appearing for the test. CAT is a mandatory admission test to the Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) and other top business schools.
In a brief statement, Prof. Rajendra K. Bandi, Convener, CAT 2016, said, “While in 2015, 82 % of the applicants took the test, this year the number swelled to 83.6 %.”
Record-high Number of Applicants
The number of applicants for the CAT 2016 has touched a record 7-year high with 2,32,434 applications received till the deadline on September 27, 2016. Last year, the number of registered candidates was 2,18,664.
Prof. Bandi had stated on September 27 that from the period CAT 2010 to CAT 2016, this was the highest number of applicants. The percentage of female candidates had marginally gone up by 1% compared to 2015.
“However, if we look at the total increase in the applications compared to last year, which is close to 14,000, almost half of these additional applications have come from female candidates. This is a positive sign. That means, the increase of female candidates is more than the increase of male candidates,” he added.
No Surprises in Exam Pattern
The exam pattern was similar to the previous year with the first slot comprising three sections–Verbal Ability & Reading Comprehension (VARC) with 34 questions, Data Interpretation & Logical Reasoning (DILR) with 32 questions and Quantitative Ability (QA) with 34 questions. The sectional time limit was 60 minutes.
The second slot was also similar to slot one in terms of the number of questions and difficulty level of the sections. However, some students reported problems in some symbols not being displayed correctly. The release of results in tentatively fixed for second week of January 2017.
