IIMs expect CAT enrolment rise after two-year dip

After a fall over two years in the numbers taking the computer-based Common Admission Test (CAT), the Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) say they expect to see a growth this year in the number of aspirants. The third computer-based edition of the yearly test, conducted by the IIMs through partner Prometric, is expected is to witness a 10 per cent rise in applications this year.

In 2008, around 276,000 aspirants appeared for CAT. This fell to 240,000 in 2009, further coming down to 206,000 in 2010.

“This is a year of consolidation for us. In the past two years, a lot of learning has taken place. We would be working on stabilising the conducting of the test and build on it. However, given the improvement in the economy, we expect a five to 10 per cent rise in applications,” says Janakiraman Moorthy, convenor, CAT 2011 and faculty member at IIM, Calcutta (IIM-C).

Expectations of such a rise in applications may also be due to an almost glitch-free CAT last year, after a bumpy start in 2009, when IIMs and Prometric had to conduct the CAT in two phases, after thousands of candidates suffered technical glitches at several centres. Prometric also discontinued its partnership with NIIT after the first stint and moved on to a tie-up with MeritTrac and Everonn.

Having taken the mantle of CAT from his predecessors, Satish Deodhar of IIM, Ahmedabad (IIM-A) and Himanshu Rai of IIM, Lucknow (IIM-L), Moorthy says he’s fortunate. “I get all the (benefit of the) learning that my predecessors had. I keep in touch with them and consult them about the whole process,” he adds.

In terms of expansion, the CAT Committee is looking to create a buffer of 10-15 per cent in terms of test centres this year.

According to Moorthy, a few more centres may be set up, depending on the requirement. Moreover, apart from the 180-odd, non-IIM B-schools being part of CAT, IIMs may be adding a few more.

“We have been getting a lot of enquiries from other domestic as well as international B-schools. While we will be allowing a few more domestic B-schools to use CAT scores, we are yet to decide upon the international ones. Nevertheless, it may not happen this year,” says Moorthy.

Meanwhile, the IIMs seem to be on their way to make CAT a round-the-year test.

“Many challenges have been taken care of since the first two computer-based tests. The one challenge that remains is of conducting the CAT in such a short testing window of 20 days for such a large number of students. We may not be able to change that this year but making CAT a round-the-year is the way forward,” Moorthy adds.