In an essay published in a commemorative 50th anniversary book about the inner workings of IIM Ahmedabad titled ‘Nurturing Institutional Excellence’, Prof Deodhar describes, “(After the CAT shed the pencil-paper format) No envelops, stamps or franking were required for dispatch of admit cards, score cards or any other information. All communication with the candidates was handled through emails and the professionally-managed official CAT website. As per one report that appeared in the media, the whole effort saved the felling of about one thousand trees in India.”
Defending the IIMs’ role in the technical glitches that marred CAT 2009’s first (mis)adventure with computer-based testing, Prof Deodhar has squarely blamed Prometric for the failures encountered. “While one expected some teething problems during the first ever computerized CAT, the IIMs had to face more than their fair share of problems, emanating entirely from the tasks and responsibilities assigned to Prometric,” he writes.
The book, which was released earlier this month by Macmillan, contains 32 insightful essays about the b-school’s internal processes, governance issues, teaching and academic center innovations written by current and past faculty members of IIM Ahmedabad and others associated with the institute such as the Directors of the IIMs at Calcutta, Bangalore and Indore each of whom trace their professional or academic origins to IIM Ahmedabad.
In another related essay in the book titled ‘Demonstrating Institutional Resilience: The CAT 2003 episode’, Prof Vijaya Sherry Chand narrates that the CAT 2003 paper leak had put the IIMs to their biggest test of credibility yet with the maximum pressure being faced by IIM Ahmedabad. While on one hand the IIMs were facing the dual pressure of conducting a retest on February 15, 2004, on the other they were grappling with unreasonable demands of the enquiry committee investigating the leak.
According to Prof Chand, the CAT 2003 paper leak happened during a delicate time when the Human Resource Development (HRD) ministry and IIM Ahmedabad were at loggerheads over various issues, one of which was about replacing the CAT with a ‘National Test’ of aptitude which the IIMs would have no control over. Conducting the retest flawlessly was therefore the only way the IIMs could have held their own against the government.
The retest was conducted in an extraordinarily secretive environment in which only the Admission Chairpersons of IIM Ahmedabad and IIM Bangalore knew the identities of agencies entrusted with printing and transporting the question papers and answer sheets to various centers across the country.
So much was the paranoia that when the CAT Committee was tipped off that miscreants in Pune were planning to steal the retest paper too, the IIM Ahmedabad Admissions chairperson traveled to Pune and spent the night of February 14 guarding the question papers in the storage room himself.
The book also contains the results of an interesting survey by Dr TV Rao observing how student perceptions about IIM Ahmedabad have changed between 1977 and now.
Dr TV Rao notes, “Seriousness in studies has gone up in the last 33 years… There is less debate and more conformity to rules and regulations. Serious intellectual discussions and joking etc have come down. Students seem to perceive the campus as a lot more serious, businesslike and system and rule and procedures driven. The number of students who feel that dissent is encouraged is also down.” To a question whether “the professors really push the students’ capacities to the limit”, only 57% agreed in 1977 compared to 86% in 2010.
Noticing a change in student motivations and behaviour, he writes that “Overall, the survey indicates that today’s student is more serious and less jovial and introverted. This perhaps is an impact of the Internet world. Social interactions seem to be much less preferred and focussed achievement is preferred, adding a lot of seriousness to life.”
‘Nurturing Institutional Excellence’ has been published by Macmillan Publishers and is being sold at a cover price of Rs 900.