Every year Directorate of Technical Education, Maharashtra conducts its Common Entrance Test (CET) for the admission to different management profiles- MBA/ MMS and PGDBM/ PGDM courses offered by various institutes and colleges in Maharashtra like JBIMS, SIMSREE, PUMBA. This state level exam is a common platform for the aspirants who want to become future managers. Hence, a candidate with a good profile (academics, work experience), good performance in the test and GD-PI round can be eligible for admission to 2 years Post Graduate Management programs offered by the top notch institutes.
MHCET was conducted over four slots in two days on 14th and 15th March, 2015. The major change that was observed in this online test in 2015 as compared to previous year tests was the change to four options instead of the standard five options. Also there were a lot of new question types while some other common questions were being out of sight. The overall breakup in terms of different sections of QA-LR-VA was same as earlier.
| Total Questions | 200 |
| Number of sections | 1 |
| Total Time | 150 minutes |
| Options Per Question | 4 |
| Marks per Question | 1 |
| Negative Marking | Nil |
The test had no negative marking providing much needed respite to the candidates to attempt as many questions as they can, in the stipulated time frame.
The given table is the overview of the exam held - MHCET 2015.
| Area | Number of questions (Approx.) | Difficulty level |
| Quantitative Aptitude | 40-45 | Moderate- Difficult |
| Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension | 45 | Easy |
| Logical Reasoning | 100 | Easy- Moderate |
| Total | 200 | Easy- Moderate |
The given below is the comprehensive table of the slots in two days:
| Area | Day 1 Slot 1 | Day 1 Slot 2 | Day 2 Slot 1 | Day 2 Slot 2 |
| QA | 44 | 45 | 36 | 42 |
| DI | 9 | 5 | 12 | 12 |
| LR | 50 | 60 | 65 | 63 |
| VR (Visual) | 25 | 22 | 25 | 24 |
| VA | 67 | 50 | 44 | 54 |
| RC | 5 | 18 | 18 | 5 |
The number of questions in this section varied in the slots. While one slot has just 5 questions from DI, the other two slots comprised of 12 questions. There were some questions which could have been solved only by looking at the options and the data; whereas the other questions required some calculations. The major feature of DI sets was that it was an easy and simple part in terms of understanding and calculations.
If we analyze the quantitative ability section, the level of questions was difficult. Majority of questions were from Arithmetic and Modern Math besides Numbers System, Linear Equations, and Geometry etc. The candidates observed that there was no question from Data Sufficiency and Quantitative Comparison in any of the four slots.
This area gave a surprise to the exam takers as the number of questions increased, as against 15-20 questions in the previous year. One slot had 25 consecutive questions on completing the series with no other part being covered; while another slot had 25 scattered questions with no question on completing the series. The Visual Reasoning questions were completely unpredictable as there were questions from mirror image, paper folding, paper cutting, identifying the figure in which a given shape could be fit etc.
The basic areas covered in the four slots in LR were Venn Diagrams, Cubes, Linear arrangements, Directions, Circular arrangements, coded Inequalities etc.
Also there were individual questions as well on directions, relationships, number and letter series, sentence coding, syllogisms, filling the missing number in a figure etc. it was a mix of easy and difficult questions.
Even RC saw a swing in the number of questions per slot in the exam. A couple of slots had only one RC while other slots had 2 RCs with 18 questions in all. The level of the passages was easy. A major portion consisted of synonyms/ antonyms. There were also the occasional inferential questions as well as Summary based questions.
Spotting the errors was a common type in all the four slots of the Verbal Ability. Cloze Passages were found in 2 slots only with 8 questions in each passage.
There were some new questions types:
Find the odd man out and word- association (both GK based), arrange the words to form a grammatically correct and meaningful sentence, identification of the word that can be attached to a given word to form a new meaningful word etc.
The major drawback of the question paper was that some questions were ambiguous in nature with no instructions given. It was more error prone than the previous tests.
.jpg?null)
