The first slot of CAT 2018 took place today between 9 am and 12 noon.
(Around 2.41 lakh candidates have registered for CAT 2018 and will be appearing for it across both the slots in 370 exam centers in 147 cities across India.)
So, what was the prestigious CAT like in the first slot?
IMS students who took the first slot of the CAT reported that VA RC section was Easy. Those who had taken the CAT in 2017 reported that VARC was slightly easier than VARC of 2017. DI LR section too was generally reported to be easy. This was in stark contrast to the rather difficult DILR of last year. The QA Section was reported by many students as difficult. Last year students had found QA rather easy.
The test interface was exactly what IMS students are used to in the SimCATs and specifically in the PreCAT. In fact, the screen had the watermark of the text “CAT 2018 S1” followed by a unique code including the candidate’s registration number, very similar to what the students experienced in the IMS Pre-CAT 2018.
It was a very user friendly interface and exactly the one provided in the official CAT Mock Test.
There were no sub-divisions within each section. The VA-RC questions were NOT interspersed within the section. Questions 1 to 24 were RC. However, the different VA question types were shuffled.
Similarly the DI and LR sets were also NOT interspersed.
A simple calculator was provided, and not a scientific one. There was an arrow provided near the question palette which when clicked expanded the question window to full screen view by hiding the question palette & vice versa.
At the end of the test, a summary of number of questions attempted, visited and not visited was displayed for each section.
There was a button marked ‘Question Paper’ which opened up a screen containing all the questions of the section. This was used by students for planning their approach for the section.
Here is the break–up of questions section-wise:
Section No. | Section Name | Total Number of Questions | Number of Multiple Choice Questions | Number of TITA Questions |
I | Verbal Ability & Reading Comprehension | 34 | 27 | 07 |
II | Data Interpretation & Logical Reasoning | 32 | 24 | 08 |
III | Quantitative Ability | 34 | 22 | 12 |
TOTAL | 100 | 73 | 27 |
Of the 10 VA questions (Shuffled) - 7 were TITA and 3 were MCQs.
Area / Questions | No of Qs. | Type | LOD |
Reading Comprehension | 24 | MCQ | (Overall: Easy to Medium) |
RC-1: Happiness and Economics. Approx. 500 words | 5 | MCQ | Easy – Medium |
RC- 2: Human elephant relationship Approx. 500 words | 5 | MCQ | Easy |
RC-3: Absence of WWII memorials in India Approx. 500 words |
5 | MCQ | Easy |
RC-4: Problem of single use plastic. Approx. 800 words | 5 | MCQ | Easy |
RC-5: Influence of parental gene in mice. – Approx. 600 words | 4 | MCQ | Medium |
Verbal Ability | 10 | MCQ & TITA | Overall: Easy to Medium |
Parajumbles ( 4 sentences) | 4 | TITA | 2 Medium 2 Easy |
Out of Context sentence | 3 | TITA | 1 Easy 2 Medium |
Summary | 3 | MCQ | 1 Easy 1 Medium 1 Difficult |
It was possible to attempt 28 to 30 questions with high accuracy in the test. An accuracy of 80 percent and above to these attempts must give you a score in the 95 - 99 percentile bracket.
A detailed description of the sets in this section is given below for your reference:
Set No. | Area | Set Description | Number of Questions | Level of Difficulty | Question Type |
1 | Data Interpretation - Calculation Based | Multi-layered pie chart based on LED sales of Electronics outlet for 2 years. | 4 | Easy | MCQ |
2 | Data Interpretation - Reasoning Based | Satellite - Venn Diagram | 4 | Difficult | MCQ |
3 | Logical Reasoning - Arrangement Based | Contamination Details of 20 pipelines | 4 | Easy-Moderate | MCQ |
4 | Logical Reasoning - ArrangementBased | 8 Students (4 Males+4 Females) to be arranged across 4 parameters | 4 | Easy | MCQ |
5 | Logical Reasoning - Grouping & Conditionalities | Committee Selection(Research,Administration, Teaching) | 4 | Easy | MCQ+TITA |
6 | Data Interpretation -Reasoning Based | ATM Money disbursal | 4 | Difficult | MCQ+TITA |
7 | Data Interpretation -Reasoning Based | Written Test Marks in 3 subjects | 4 | Easy-Moderate | MCQ + TITA |
8 | Logical Reasoning - Puzzle Based | Magic Square (n*n matrix) | 4 | Easy | MCQ+TITA |
Some of the sets that could have been definitely solved were the ones based on the multi layered pie chart ,committee selection, magic square and arrangement of 8 students (4 males and 4 females).
Overall the section was marginally easier as compared to last year slot 1. If you would have solved around 5 sets (18-20 questions) in this section with 85% accuracy, then you would be in the safe zone.
This section was moderate to difficult. In fact as per student feedback it seems to be amongst the toughest QA section in recent years.
Area | Topic | No. of Questions | Total No. of Questions | Level of Difficulty |
Numbers | Indices | 1 | 2 | Moderate |
Reverse number | 1 | Moderate | ||
Algebra | Quadratic Equations | 1 | 2 | Easy-Moderate |
High Degree Equations | 1 | Moderate | ||
Arithmetic | Ratios & Percentage | 2 | 14 | Easy |
Averages | 2 | Moderate | ||
Time-Speed-Distance | 3 | Easy-Moderate | ||
Profit & Loss | 1 | Moderate-Difficult | ||
Mixture & Alligation | 2 | Easy-Moderate | ||
Work & Time | 2 | Easy-Moderate | ||
Compound interest (Annual installment) | 1 | Moderate | ||
Pipes & Cisterns | 1 | Easy-Moderate | ||
Geometry | Circles | 2 | 6 | Easy-Moderate |
Parallelogram | 1 | Moderate | ||
Rectangle | 1 | Easy | ||
Mensuration - Cone & Frustum | 1 | Easy | ||
Square | 1 | Moderate-Difficult | ||
Modern Math | Logarithm | 3 | 10 | Moderate |
Sequence & Series (AP & GP) | 2 | Easy-Moderate | ||
Functions | 2 | Easy-Moderate | ||
Set theory | 2 | Easy | ||
P & C | 1 | Moderate | ||
TOTAL | 34 | 34 |
Overall,an attempt of 19 to 21 questions in this section with 85% accuracy should be a good bet.
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