CAT 2015: Registration number may decline this year; current registrations below 1 lac

CAT 2015 registration statistics indicate not a very rosy picture as the number of CAT 2015 aspirants till September 12, 2015 were less than 1 lac even after the lapse of 38 days in a 46 day registration window that opened on August 6, 2015 and is proposed to close on September 20, 2015.

Prof Tathagata Bandyopadhyay, CAT 2015 convener and faculty at IIM Ahmedabad shares the CAT 2015 registration statistics as on September 13, 2015 that approximate number of applicants registered so far is over 92000. CAT 2014 had around 1.97 lac registrations, the expectation was that the number of registrations for CAT 2015 should go upto 2 lac candidates.

The implication of such a high number of expected applicants in just 4-5 days is that the registration site of CAT 2015 may get some technical problems at least for the candidates who choose to register on the last day.
With an increased intake of around 5000 seats in PGP programmes in 19 IIMs at present and one proposed to open in 2016, it was expected that higher number of candidates than last year would register and apply for CAT 2015, but with only a few days left it appears difficult to achieve the last years target even.

Early days with lukewarm response
The response during the first half of registration window for CAT 2015 was not very encouraging. Gradually the registration number picked up but still it is much behind the last years mark. It happened last year also but later on it picked up very fast and as a result the CAT site could not cope with the rush. CAT Centre had to re-open the CAT registration window to enable the candidates to complete their registration and application and make their payments.

In CAT 2015, even if we estimate around 10000 registrations per day for next 5 days, the total wouldnt reach 1.5 lac, not to say of surpassing the registration figure of past year CAT. It appears that the registration number in CAT 2015 may get a dip if some other measures are not taken.

Shortest CAT 2015 failed to be the number puller
Despite the shortest testing window of one day that too on Sunday November 29, CAT 2015 has not yet shown any impact so far in increasing the number of CAT 2015 registrations. The exam will have only 2 sessions as against multiple sessions, still the number in registration has not increased so far although 5 days are left to finalise the registration for CAT 2015.

Aspirant friendly changes go in vain
CAT 2015 has introduced many changes in the exam pattern. Number of sections has been increased from 2 to 3, time limit has been increased by 10 minutes for the same number of 100 questions, Non-MCQ type questions without any negative marking for wrong answer have been introduced in each of the 3 sections for the first time along with MCQs but the situation to have more applicants in CAT 2015 still remains grim and the number may not touch the number of earlier CAT registrations.

Heavy rush in last few days to facilitate extension in date
It is very much possible that due to heavy rush of candidates to register for CAT 2015 in last 2-3 days, CAT Centre 2015 might be compelled to extend the registration date especially to avoid any technical problem occurring on the CAT registration site.

There are number of candidates who have completed their registration process but have not paid the registration fee due to which their registration for CAT 2015 is lying incomplete. On the top of it, they might have also missed to remember the completion of registration process. It will therefore be a good idea for CAT Centre 2015 to extend the registration date for few more days for the benefit of CAT 2015 aspirants.