Its official, CAT goes online this year

The Common Admission Test (CAT) conducted by the Indian Institutes of Management (IIM) will be a Computer Based Test(CBT) starting this year. The proposal which was made in 2008 has finally been approved by all the institutes. The CAT committee has entered into an agreement with Prometric ETS for the computer based test.

Even as the official decision was made public, aspirants for the 2009 CAT remained confused about details pertaining to structure of the test, test centres etc. According to Dr. A Unnithan, Admissions Chairperson at IIM-K as well as Prof. Amarnath Krishnaswamy, Faculty-in-charge of the Communications unit at IIM-B, the CAT is not likely to be an adaptive test like the GRE/GMAT this year. However nothing has been mentioned about the exact manner in which the test would be administered or the location of test centres.

It has, however, been indicated that candidates can  select a convenient date for the test within the specified ten day period. Describing the computerization of the test as “a natural culmination of the modernization CAT has undergone,” IIM-B has indicated that the CBT-CAT will be a more candidate-friendly test in terms of flexibility in the selection of test date, ease of registration process, better physical environment and test experience. The levels of security for the test will also be higher now with biometric identification of candidates and video monitoring expected to be in place. The new CBT  will be adopted by all the IIMs across Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Kolkata, Indore, Kozhikode, Lucknow and Shillong.

The new on line system has been put in place to help cope with the growing numbers of CAT takers each year. The number of students who took the CAT last year was 2.5 Lakh, the numbers are expected to rise this year.

More details and information regarding the new system of CBT-CAT will be made available to all aspirants with the release of the CAT application advertisements for 2009.