(Photo credit: Tarun Chawla)

The entrance test for Institute of Rural Management, Anand (IRMA) will be held on Sunday, November 14. With less than a week to go, a quick-guide on preparing for it is in order. I had a talk with few current students of IRMA about advice they would like to give to those who are serious about getting in.

I had a talk with Amresh Sinha, Amresh Kumar, Jnanesh Jha, Pritesh Kumar Lal and Avantika Garg (all from the IRMA batch of 2010-12) and here is what they say.

What is the ideal position to be in now, given that there is less than a week to go for the test? What should one focus on during this phase? How many mocks are recommended in this period?

According to Amresh Sinha, With less than a week to go for the exam, aspirants must try to finalise their strategies for the exam. It is better to make sure to revise all the basic fundas and concepts. Ideally, one should not try anything new around this time. Do not try to spend time on learning new concepts. One needs to gain momentum and build up one’s confidence level. Hence, mocks are good as long as they help you, but that would vary from one aspirant to another. So, it is finally the aspirant who needs to think about how many mocks to take before the exam. A strict NO to mocks at least the day before exam . The last 2-3 days should be spent relaxing and not taking undue stress.

Amresh Kumar adds, First go through previous papers, and revise the topics and problems which appear regularly, as the pattern is more or less the same. And one can easily figure out in some sections that topic X would carry Y number of questions. No mocks needed at this stage. But identifying and practising all the topics is the key.

According to Pritesh, The aspirant should complete the IRMA syllabus on the ‘Issues of Social Concern’. At least one practice set of Bank PO tests should be. One should try to solve the last year’s paper in 1.5 hours. About 50 questions each from math and DI/LR and 40 questions of English should be the target in 1.5 hours time. One should lay more emphasis on building one’s speed. One should be well-versed with the common squares, cubes and reciprocals.

According to Avantika, At this point in time, you should practise previous year’s IRMA test papers and make yourself comfortable with the idea of solving 200 questions in 2 hours. Also keep yourself updated with the current affairs especially Social General Knowledge (government schemes, rural initiatives and important policies) upto a week before the exam. Don’t do any new concepts now and just revise whatever you’ve done till now.

Any particular section or topic one should focus on?

According to Amresh Sinha, Issues of Social Concern (ISC) has always been an uncomfortable zone for most of the test-takers. So one should not take it lightly and adequate amount of time should be spent while preparing for the section. Also, one has to revise all the basic concepts of all the sections. Make sure you give all the sections equal importance. Usually, many of us tend to overlook our stronger points which can actually kill our chances. A lot of aspirants commit silly mistakes in their areas of strengths, thus losing out on a call.

Amresh Kumar adds, Don’t take the analytical reasoning section lightly, as many of us still doubt authenticity of the answers to those questions. To be on the safer side give more time to this section during the exam.

According to Pritesh, The deciding factor in the IRMA test is the ISC section; this is one section which can make or break a persons chance to qualify for the second stage so preparing for it would provide an extra edge in the interview too. Reading newspapers and magazines like Yojna, Kurushetra, Pratyogita Darpan would increase the general awareness of an aspirant.

According to Avantika, As such you need to score equally well across all the 4 sections as there are individual cut-offs for each section in order to qualify. So, try to attempt all sections as accurately as you can so as to maximise your score. But in particular, focus on the Analytical Reasoning section which contains inference and deduction questions as speed and accuracy is very important here. Given the time frame, this section is a little time consuming and the chances of making an error are pretty high.

But she has a few words of caution, Do not go with preconceived notions about the paper as the pattern might change.

More attempts or less number of attempts with a higher accuracy. Which one is preferred?

According to Amresh Sinha, There is no particular magical formula. The cut-offs (overall) have been increasing over the years and the competition has become more intense for IRMA. So, ideally anything above 120 attempts with 90% accuracy should be good enough. Having said that, one really cannot rely on these permutations and combinations. So, I would advise aspirants to maximise their attempts with an accuracy of 90% – 95%. In case your attempts are 140 +, make sure that your accuracy does not fall below 90%. This applies even to the individual sections.

According to Amresh Kumar, I had less accuracy so I used to attempt more, but still speed is important if the cut off is going to be 100+ as it was last year.

According to Pritesh, My personal opinion is that accuracy should be given more importance over the number of attempts as it is a sheer waste of time and effort to attempt many questions and it might lead to a heavy number of negatives.

According to Avantika, Last year, the cut-off was 110 out of 200. You have to balance both accuracy and speed as this exam tests both. Given the number of questions and the cut-off, your attempts should be backed with a high accuracy of say 85-90%. The paper allows you to balance both, provided you concentrate hard during the exam. First, attempt all the questions you are sure of quickly and then attempt the others.

What sources should one refer to for cracking the ‘Issues of Social Concern’ section?

Replies Amresh Sinha, One should keep abreast of all the current happenings especially those related to the Indian economy, Agriculture, WTO, SAARC meetings, etc. Get hold of the Survey of Indian agriculture and the Indian economy (from The Hindu). It is important to know the winners of common awards, such as the Indira Gandhi prize, Magasaysay Award, etc.

Amresh Kumar has a few pointers,

• “First complete the syllabus given by IRMA and get hold of the IMS material too.

• Refer to the Rural Development Ministry annual report, look at the programs being run by ministry such as MGREGA, SSA, MDMS, SGSY,PMGSY, NRHM, IAY etc.

• Go through the Union Budget and other important national data such as GDP distribution etc. A good source is the Pratiyogita Darpan annual “Indian Economy issue.

• Read and learn about popular NGOs such as PRADAN, SEWA, etc.

• Learn about initiatives by IRMANS from IRMA Alumni Association Website.

• Read about social activists such as Medha Patkar, etc,

• Read up about awards such as the Magsaysay Award, Bharat Ratna, etc.

• Some important topics: Micro finance, E-chaupal, Watershed Development.

According to Pritesh, One should certainly read last one year’s issues of Pratyogita Darpan, Yojana and Kurushetra. The special issue of Indian Economy by Pratyogita Darpan, the website of the Union Rural Development Ministry, Planning Commission, etc, are other good sources.”

According to Avantika, At this point, a regular reading of a couple of good newspapers and a quick glance through the highlights of this year from a yearbook or a magazine should help. Also try laying your hands on a consolidated list of all the Government schemes and programmes launched since 1970 on Food security, agriculture, rural development, infrastructure, etc. Focus more on flagship programmes of the last 5 years, such as the NREGA, SGSY and other employment and social welfare schemes.

How should answer the ISC section? Does one mark an answer only when they are sure or should one take a few risks in the section for maximising their score?

According to Amresh Sinha, There have been a number of cases of people who did extremely well in the exam but still could not get an interview call just because they goofed up the ISC section. Never make blind guesses, as they are as close to getting a negative as you think they are to scoring a mark. Probably the last remaining week can be used for ISC preparation. Usually, one can find about 5-8 sitters in the section, which all of us have read back in school. And there will be 10-12 questions where one can get to the correct option by some common-sense and by elimination methods. Adequate preparation can easily give you a score of 20 -25. But, never go for all the questions assuming that you will get at least half of them right and dont just blindly mark them. Choices like ‘All the above’ or ‘None of them’ can be very tempting to mark, but make sure you understand the question well before answering. Just a bit of common-sense and a calm mind can sail you through the section whereas an act of haste can close the doors even if you score a perfect 99.99% in rest of the sections. Fix that into your minds.

According to Amresh Kumar, If someone is assured of getting around 30-35 % in this section then one shouldn’t take any chances. Many questions will have answer option of ‘All of the above’. Beware of such questions.

According to Pritesh, A few calculated risks can be taken. But if a person is trying to attempt something from a totally unknown territory then it can lead to trouble. I remember in the 2008 IRMA test — I had attempted 33 in ISC but could get only 18 marks, 3 marks more than the cut-off for ISC. But I couldnt clear the cut-off in two sections because I had given 35 minutes to ISC. If a person attempts more, he can clear the cut-off in ISC but it can be disastrous for the other sections.

According to Avantika, This section should be attempted in the end as it requires the least amount of time. Normally, candidates are in a hurried state in the last 20 minutes so sections like ISC should be kept for the end as no calculations or thinking is required. First you should attempt the sure-shot questions which you’re confident of. Then you can scan the section again to see the questions which you are a little bit sure of and use elimination and intelligent guesswork for choosing one out of the two options you have narrowed down to. Blind guessing might invariably result in negative marking, but calculative guessing might actually help boost your score.

What should be the time allocated to every section? How did you plan your paper?

According to Amresh Sinha, ISC is all about ‘either you know it or you dont’. The rest of the sections can be dealt according to ones strengths and weaknesses. But make sure you go through all the questions from all the sections. Dont focus so much on your area of strength that you get lost in it. At the same time dont give more time to the areas which you are weak in. Never get stuck on a question or in a section. The key to clear this exam is in managing your time. One should have a strategy to tackle the paper beforehand as part of their preparation. Dont spend more than 30-35 minutes on each section. At the maximum you can spend 40 minutes on a section. Also, never mark the entire OMR sheet at the end, thats not wise. Circle the answer as and when you get an answer.

Amresh Kumar recollects that he had done the Quantitatve Aptitude section in 30 minutes, the English Usage section in 30 minutes, the Analytical Reasoning section in 40 minutes, and the ISC section in 20 minutes.

He further adds, My prime objective was to clear sectional cut-off, rather than maximising my overall score, which proved to be a wise move, as many test takers couldn’t clear the high sectionals and even an overall 91 percentile was good enough to fetch the call, and there are people who have converted calls at that score.

According to Pritesh, I solved Maths in 25 minutes I attempted 43 and got 36 marks. I solved English in 15 minutes attempted 32 and got 28 marks. My attempts in ISC were 31 and I got 29 in it. I dont remember my attempts in DI/LR but I got 32 in that section. Maths being my strength I started with it and then went about solving DI/LR then ISC and I solved English in the end. I completed whole test with 10 minutes remaining. ISC is the section in which a person with solid preparation can solve get around 35-40 marks in 10-15 minutes and thus can increase his/her overall score too in the process. I think 15 minutes for ISC, 35 minutes each for maths and DI/LR and 25 minutes for English will be an ideal allocation.

Avantika presents another point of view, Attempt the ISC section in the last 15 minutes. I suppose that should be sufficient as either you know the answers or you don’t, so 10 seconds per question should be fine. The rest of the time should be divided more or less equally amongst the 3 other sections, but it could vary depending on your strengths and weaknesses. Remember to first see the marks and questions allocation across the 3 sections before making any strategy.

What weightage does the written score carry in the overall process?

According to Amresh Sinha, The written score does carry a heavy weightage but these things can be thought of after the results. I suggest that aspirants don’t think about these things and better concentrate on how to sail through the entrance exam for now.

According to Pritesh, 50% for written, 40% for personal interview and 10% for group discussion and group task.

Any final words?

According to Amresh Sinha, Make sure you are very relaxed and stay calm on the D-day. Most falter because of stress and are unable to keep a calm mind, despite very good preparation and lots of hardwork. It is good to chill out and have a good time the day before exam; go catch a movie (not a horror movie though), go to a beach or do anything that makes you feel better and stay positive. Eat good food, take lots of water or juices and get a good sound sleep the night before the exam. Hoping to see you soon at IRMA. I am waiting.

According to Amresh Kumar, The whole focus is on the issues of social concern. If one can concentrate on this section and practice a few previous year papers then it will be very easy for the aspirants. Also it is advised to skip questions which are difficult during the test.

Avantika concludes, These are just guidelines or markers based on my experience of last year. But b-school entrance paper patterns are prone to change so don’t blindly follow any one strategy. Develop your own strategy and at the same time be ready to alter it a bit based on your perception of the paper. Keep track of the time as candidates usually tend to solve the questions leisurely in the first 40 minutes only to realise that they have lost out on a significant amount of time. After skimming through the paper, quickly decide the time allocation per section and stick to it. Also mark all the answers directly on the OMR sheet and not on the question paper. Try completing one section before going to the next as normally there is no time to come back to the sections you are done with. Prepare well and wish you ALL THE BEST!!!