Kalvimalar

Test date	January
Institutes accepting this test score	40 institutes
Total duration of the test (minutes)	120 minutes +20 minutes for essay
Total number of questions	130 + essay
Timed test	individual sections are not timed
Number of section	3
Number of choices per question	5
Marks per question	1
Negative marking	Differential
Stationery to be used for OMR
Answer Sheets	HB pencil

The XLRI Aptitude Test (XAT) is one of the five national level entrance tests for admissions to MBA programmes conducted by B-schools all over India.  The Xavier Labour Research Institute (XLRI) conducts the XAT entrance test and its score is valid for admissions to several leading B-schools of the country.  In 2006, the forms were made available to students from September onwards and they have to be filled out and submitted online on the website www.xlri.edu/xat.
 
XLRI-Jamshedpur, XIM-Bhubaneswar, SIBM-Pune, and S.P.  Jain Institute of Management and Research are some of the B-schools that accept XAT scores.
  
The details pertaining to this exam are given below:
 
Test Details
The exam was conducted on 4th January 2009.  There were 130 questions and an essay.  A distinctive feature this year was that the questions had 5 options instead of 4.

The three-section format was maintained but Data Interpretation was combined with Quantitative Ability.
 
The test taker had to answer questions from all three sections and was expected to maximize scores in each section, though there was no section-wise time limit.
 
Section 1: Quantitative ability
The number of questions on Quantitative Ability has decreased to 36 as compared to last year�s 44, but the difficulty level was slightly higher.  This section includes Problem Solving, Data Interpretation and Data Sufficiency. The questions were from areas of Arithmetic � Numbers, Time Speed & Distance, Ratio Proportion & Variation: Algebra � Cubic Equation, Simultaneous Equations; Geometry � Triangles, Rectangles, areas of Higher Mathematics � Hyperbola, Sequence & Series, Sets, Function, Progression, Probability.  There were Number Puzzles, Logical Puzzles and Cryptarithms also to solve.
 
There were 4 questions based on Data Sufficiency [Numbers (1), Geometry (2) and Functions (1) ].  Of the 13 Data Interpretation questions, 2 were on bar graph.   The reasonable attempt in this section would be 15+ questions.
 
Section 2: Reasoning ability and Decision Making
This section had 40 questions.  There were 30 questions on Logical Reasoning.  The sets were simple to interpret but the options were designed in such a way that every option had to be weighed properly before arriving at the correct answer.
 
Of the four business cases, three incorporated typical corporate situations like problems in employee selection strategy and personnel policies and had mostly inferential questions, while one case was a combination of problem solving, logical reasoning, Data Interpretation and English and had questions of a higher level of difficulty.
 
A reasonable attempt in this section would be 17+ questions.