Outside Army Public School, the XAT test centre in Dhaula Kuan, New Delhi (Photo credit: Astha A)

A changed paper pattern with the introduction of a General Knowledge section and an additional forty minutes of testing time was top of mind for many appearing for the Xaviers Admission Test (XAT) 2013 today. However, the fears were all put to rest as the GK section was found to be the most doable among the lot.

The Verbal Section was in fact the sore point, said an aspirant.

Shirish Nigam, a candidate who took the exam at Sinhgad Institute of Management, Pune, said, “The paper was very lengthy. The Verbal section, especially RCs were difficult.” Another candidate at the same centre, Salil Subheshwari added, “Quant was not very difficult whereas Verbal was challenging. General Awareness was easier compared to some of the other exams.”

Candidates appearing for the test at Army Public School centre in Dhaula Kuan, Delhi said that anyone who had been reading newspapers daily for the past one year would be able to answer a good portion of the GK section. “Even if someone has been paying attention to the newspaper headlines, they should be able to attempt at least 20 of the 30 GK questions,” Khagesh Batra, a candidate at the centre told PaGaLGuY.

Ankur Kushwaha, another XAT aspirant added that he found the GK section to be at par with the GK sections of the Symbiosis National Aptitude Test (SNAP) and Common Management Admission Test (CMAT). However, according to Hitesh Pratap Chhonker, another XAT aspirant from Delhi, it would be difficult to compare the level of difficulty in the IIFT and XAT tests. “I feel that IIFT has more static questions, like names of natural resources. On the other hand, XAT required more precise knowledge of business and statistics,” he said.

Presenting a slightly different view, Ayush Vashishth, another test taker at the centre said that for him the GK section was tough. “Multiple choices within the options themselves made it necessary for the candidate to have vast knowledge of facts, he said.

The extra time that has been allotted to aspirants did not affect the candidates too much. Hardik Singhvi, a test taker from Delhi, said that “GK did not take much time as either you know the answers or you dont. Even if one takes 15 minutes to solve the GK part, one still had a good 25 minutes to attempt the essay.”

Ashim Gupta, a candidate from Pune, who took the test last year as well, said, “The overall exam was tougher than last year. The extra time allotted didnt really make any difference as there were additional questions.” The sentiment was echoed by Ankit Jaiswal, a working professional who took the exam in St. Fidelis college in Lucknow.

Mohit Nigam did not alter his study strategy greatly after knowing about the change of pattern. He said, “I did not change my strategy for the exam. I read the papers so I was well prepared for the general awareness section.” Aditya Sharma, another aspirant, added that his coaching centre definitely changed their teaching strategy and devoted some time towards the new general awareness section and that helped.

Although candidates who took their paper at the Dronacharya College of Engineering in Gurgaon agreed that the paper was not too difficult, they said that the location of their centre and extreme cold made their testing conditions difficult. “The Gurgaon centre is at least 30 kms outside the city. It took me a while to locate the centre early morning in the severe cold weather,” Sonali Gupta, a test taker at the Gurgaon centre said.

For the majority of the students, the test-taking experience was a smooth one. However, some like Prasun Upadhyay in Pune faced a little bit of a trouble with the invigilators. He said, “The invigilator was giving all the instructions in Marathi. I do not understand Marathi. It is important to understand all instructions otherwise you might miss out on something crucial. When we told her this, she asked one of us to read out the instructions.”

Vijay Chandola, another test taker at Gurgaon voiced a complaint. “We were not allowed to use the washroom. In such cold temperatures, sitting in one space for continous three hours resulted in numb fingers, which affected the speed of writing.”

Last year, for the Human Resource Management (HRM) Programme, applicants with 80 percentile in the English Language (EL) section, 80 percentile in Decision Making (DM), 70 percentile in Quantitative Aptitude (AQ) and 88 percentile overall had been shortlisted for the next rounds. The XAT cut-offs for BM had been 70 percentile in EL, 80 percentile in DM, 92 percentile in QA and overall 90 percentile.