CAT 2012 Analysis@ CAT takers, experts dissect Day 1

(prHWY.com) October 12, 2012 - Noida, India -- The Day 1 of CAT 2012 was conducted without any untoward incident. Thursday, October 11 saw 4,429 candidates taking the test across centers. There has not been any major technical snag reported. However, there have been some reports of server errors from a few test centers in Delhi, Kolkata and Hyderabad.

Soumitra Roy, MD, Prometric India said, "We are pleased that the first day of testing has ended smoothly. We will continue to stay focussed on providing candidates with the best possible experience."

This article of MBAUniverse.com shares with you the detailed analysis of the Day 1.

The difficulty level of the exam was easy to moderate. The first two slots of Day 1 did not throw any surprises. Let us have a look at the section-wise analysis.

Quantitative ability & data interpretation

The quantitative ability & data interpretation section was tougher compared with the verbal ability & logical reasoning section. "Though some of the Quant questions were tricky and tough, they were manageable. An attempt of 18 to 20 questions would be sufficient to get the cut off," said Gautam Puri, vice-chairman, Career Launcher.

The topics from which the questions appeared in quantitative ability are number systems, arithmetic, functions & graphs, mensuration, permutation & combination, logarithms, geometry and algebra. The weightage on quantitative ability section was more than data interpretation. "The data interpretation questions were calculation intensive," said Arks Srinivas, CEO VistaMind Education.

The data interpretation questions were also lengthy and time consuming as they were calculation intensive. According to Aishwarya Chandra, a CAT 2012 Day 1 taker, the difficulty level of the section was higher than she had expected. "Most of the Quant questions were more difficult than the mocks I took."

In the second slot, the data interpretation questions had more weightage. "Geometry and DI were a bit tricky for me. There were five to six questions on algebra, four questions on permutation & combination and mensuration mixed," said Anmol Garg, a final year BBA student of IMS Noida.

Adarsh Sinha, another CAT taker, said, "Some questions appeared as surprises in terms of the difficulty level in the first section. But Quant is my forte, so it was not much of a problem for me."

Verbal ability & logical reasoning

This difficulty level of this section was easy. The verbal ability area had a good mix of English usage and reading comprehension questions. There were three reading comprehension passages of medium length. The English usage areas had questions on para jumbles, para completion, fill in the blanks, vocabulary and appropriate usage of word/sentences. These questions were of easy to moderate difficulty level and answerable. However, the reading comprehension questions were a bit tough. "Some of the questions in the verbal ability were challenging. The reading comprehension questions were tricky. The logical reasoning questions were too simple," mentions Srinivas.
Deepak Kumar Mishra, another CAT 2012 taker of Day 1, said, "I found the second section lengthy. I have attempted questions on para jumble, fill in the blanks and reading comprehension areas. I am sure about the accuracy of the English usage and logical reasoning questions, but I can't say the same about reading comprehension questions."

According to Gautam Puri, an attempt of 20 to 22 questions is good enough.

Vinayak Kudva, Product Head, IMS Learning, said, "The questions reflected past year's pattern only and there was no such surprise. Apart from the tough questions in the Quant and verbal area, the questions were of doable nature. Any candidate with good preparation would be able to score a percentile above 90."

CAT 2012 has started from October 11 and will end on November 6. October 13 is the second day of CAT 2012 after a gap of one day. The exam will be taken by around 2.14 lakh candidates.

To read more about CAT 2012 Day 1, click on the following link:

No surprise at CAT Day 1, Quant section a bit tough

Stay tuned to MBAUniverse.com for more updates on CAT 2012.

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