IIMs woo non engg grads

​Hyderabad: Here is some good news for non-engineering students aspiring to crack the Common Admission Test (CAT) as the 19 IIMs in the country are keen on attracting non-engineers into their classrooms.

The reason: For more diversity. “It is a myth that only engineering background students have an advantage. It is actually a level-playing field. The ranking percentile is usually higher for engineering students as the number of aspirants is also more from engineering but this is changing.

For some time now, IIMs have been making the right noises about increasing diversity on their campuses, but the format of the exam, which is maths-heavy, is definitively skewed in favour of engineers and, by implication, against humanities majors.

“Vinitha, a student was able to get 92 % last year who was from non-engineering,” says Varma Rajasagi of an education and training services institution. He said winds of change are blowing across the country as more and more IIMs are open to the idea to give admissions to students from Social Sciences.

Contrary to popular perception that all IIMs have same criteria for admissions, Varma says, “IIM Indore and IIM Vishakhapatnam give more weightage to academic score as well as past academic record.” He further goes on to add that there is lack of awareness that non-creamy layer OBC (NCLOBC) students, who get 85 % marks, stand a good chance to get into IIMs.

The cut-off mark is likely to reduce further and the non-engineering candidates will have an advantage. While the cut-off mark for engineering stands at 98%, it is 92% for non engineering candidates. Engineering graduates are to lose 10 per cent of the seats.

M V Reddy, a pioneer in the education and training for competitive exams, says, “IIMs now want more diversity and several of them give a lot of importance to the interview. For example, IIM Bengaluru gives less weightage to CAT score and more to overall academic performance. They want to look at the overall personality of the student.”

Echoing a similar view is Durga Shankar, another trainer who says it may take a while for non-engineers to match up to the engineers in IIMs but the very fact that IIMs are keen and are tweaking the admission criteria is in their favour.
How IIMs are attracting non-engineering candidates

• Each IIM has its own criteria for selection and majority of them are giving more weightage to interview, academic record, experience and group discussion
• The cut-off mark for non-engineering candidates to be reduced
• As on date male non-engineering graduates need a minimum of 95 per cent to get a call from IIMs; it is 98% for engineering grads and women candidates with 92% and above stand a good chance

If about 2 lakh appear for the CAT exam across the country, 30,000 aspirants are from Telangana and Andhra Pradesh. M V Reddy says, “The maximum number of students is from Delhi followed by Mumbai. Hyderabad stands fifth in the country.”

Presently, 20 per cent of candidates in training institutes comprise of non-engineering background but this number is bound to rise in the coming days, say education experts. Another trend that is noticed is that about a decade ago, only freshers would apply but now people first work for a few years, take a break and crack the CAT.

The non-engineering graduates do stand a better chance now say experts as their verbal skills are good. Ramanamurthy, a personality development trainer says, “This change in attitude of the IIMs is welcome as it not only allows a level-playing field but also goes to show that in the globalised world, a corporate leader with an all-round personality is sure to do well. It is not to belittle engineering graduates but even people from other streams are good enough.”