Unlike IIFT or XAT wherein weightage to General Awareness section is less than other sections, CMAT awards full sectional weightage to GK with equal number of questions and marks. Similarly the marking pattern as advised by AICTE indicates that CMAT 2015 second test to be held in Feb 2015 will have 25 questions with 100 marks allotted to General Awareness (GK) like other 3 sections namely Quant, English and Reasoning.
Every correct answer will award you 4 marks improving your score and awarding you higher place in merit. Since all the 4 sections have equal number of questions in CMAT, General Awareness will play the same role in pushing up your merit position in CMAT as other sections can do.
The area to study and enrich your General Awareness is too vast to contain it one particular field of study. Whatever you are reading, it adds to enrich your General knowledge in one or other way. Prof S K Agarwal expert and mentor on CAT/XAT/CMAT preparation stresses on the need is to understand the basics “How and what to prepare to improve the General Awareness”.
No special skill needed
Study of any subject is not so vast as the study of General Knowledge or as you put it General Awareness. But on the other hand, the best part on preparation for GK is that you do not need any special skill set as required for Quant and Verbal. What you need is your inclination and interest in regular reading of books and periodicals. There is still one month to XAT 2015 and more than 2 months to CMAT 2015 (second test). You can prepare well on the GK section and can score high in this section in the next one month or so.
Divide the GK to begin with
General Knowledge can be well prepared by dividing it in 4 broad sections namely Current Affairs; Business & Economics; International Events; Conventional GK. You are now supposed to focus on each one of them. Current affairs and international events as the names suggest can be well prepared by reading news papers and periodicals regularly. National and International news on TV will add to enrich your knowledge. Current who’s who; awards; policy formation; sports news; world events etc can be found in news papers.
If you can read them with interest, you can remember them. It will be better if you write some clues to remember them.
GK Conventional: Good books available
Conventional GK requires reading and revision. It can be well revised from books. You must be preparing and reading some books like Manorama Year Book, General Knowledge refresher, General Knowledge by S. Chand & Co or any other book. These books contain conventional type of GK as well as the current GK till their publication date.
GK: Business and Economics
You may expect not less than 6-7 questions in GK section on Business and Economics. The topics on Business, finance and Economy could be prepared by reading good news papers like Economic Times, Financial times, periodicals like Business Standard, The Economist. You can also go for comprehensive year book like Manorama to cover the other related topics.
Try to correlate the outcomes and economy based decisions with past happenings. Please remember this is one of the most favourite sections of GK that appear in the CMAT entrance examinations. Business and finance oriented General Knowledge improves your understanding of economic environment, strengthening your IQ and making you better equipped to face the Group discussions and Personal Interviews also.
If you are a regular reader of the business, economy pages of newspapers and have the habit of marking the striking events, you must already be knowing a lot on it. Questions on these topics are not tough but have very close options. For example questions like Monetary and Fiscal authority of the country; ‘What is the current CRR’, ‘Difference between CRR & SLR’ ‘Quantitative and Qualitative Instruments for money control’, ‘where the budget is presented first in Loksabha or Rajyasabha’, and so on are not difficult but need a close watch on changes in the economy.
Constitution of India: An important source of questions
General Knowledge questions on the Constitution of India could be tricky. It will be better to go through the section on constitution of India in your year book. The questions may be asked on anything written, practiced and amended in the constitution. They may have the range on the election process of President, Vice President, Speaker of Lok Sabha/Rajya Sabha, procedure of key appointments, amendments, number of states, state capitals, who’s is who and so on.
You are still left with 2 months to CMAT Sep 2014. Rest assured you can prepare, revise and groom the General Awareness very well during this period, if you could schedule your preparation plan well and follow the above given preparation tips.
CMAT 2015(Second test): Registration open
All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) opened the registration process for the Second National Level Common Management Admission Test (CMAT) 2015. The exam is to be conducted from February 19 to 22, 2015. AICTE conducts 2 CMAT exams in a year to select suitable students for admission in management programmes. The second CMAT aims to select candidates for the PGDM batch 2015-17.
The on-line Registration process for second CMAT 2015 was opened on November 6, 2014 and will continue till January 5, 2015. Registration and application fee for CMAT 2015 second test is Rs. 1400/- and for SC/ST/PD candidates the test fee is Rs.700/-.
Related Links
CMAT 2015: Top CMAT accepting colleges; Admission 2015
CMAT 2015: Second Test; Key points in Registration process
AICTE's CMAT 2015-16 Second Test on Feb 19 to Feb 22, 2015: Registration opened on Nov 6, 2014
Stay tuned to MBAUniverse.com for more updates and tips on CMAT 2015 second test
