IPMAT 2019 Exam Analysis & Expected Cutoff | IPM Program at IIM Indore

Endeavor Careers Posted on May 10, 2019

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IPMAT 2019 Exam Analysis

Overview of IPMAT 2019:

Total Questions: 100 | Duration: 120 minutes | Marking: +4 for Correct & -1 for incorrect answers (MCQ) and no negative for Short Answer based questions

IPMAT 2019, as usual, did live up to its expectations. As expected, the exam was divided into 3 sections with equal sectional time limits of 40 minutes each. No technical glitches or any such issues reported from any centre, so it is safe to assume that the exam conduction process was perfect.

Verbal Ability section has maintained similar pattern and level of difficulty as previous years. This is one reason why cut-off in this section goes higher than that in Quantitative Ability.

Quantitative Ability section was divided into two parts. Both the sections were loaded with questions from Functions, Logarithm, Inequalities, Matrices and Determinants. In all, this year Quantitative Aptitude Section was difficult as compared to that of last year. But with smart selection of questions, one could easily clear the cut-off in these sections. The ideal approach should have been to maximise score from MCQ based question whereas, in Short answer based question, one must ensure that they do the minimum required in order to get a good platform at least.

Section 1: Quantitative Aptitude (Short Answer)

Total Questions: 20
Duration: 40 Minutes

This section was more or less a replica of MCQ based questions with a higher level of difficulty. There were around 3 questions each from Geometry, Functions, Numbers and its application, and Matrices. The question based on co-ordinate geometry was very easy and those based on numbers were easy to moderate; except one which was easy but tricky, where most students were bound to make an error. 2 questions on Logarithms were moderate to difficult. Questions (1 each) on Successive Percentage change and Averages were very easy. Questions (1 each) from Inequalities and Determinants were difficult. An online calculator was available in this section.

Most of these questions were on mixed applications of concepts. In fact, there were hardly any questions which were on a standalone concept. This makes this section tough to crack for 12^th standard students, who are in habit of applying one concept at a time.

This section will also be classified as tough. Ideal attempts in 40 minutes would be 9+ and good score in this section can be 6+ net correct or raw score of 24+.

Section 2: Quantitative Aptitude (MCQ)

Total Questions: 40
Duration: 40 Minutes

This section was dominated by Higher Algebra and Higher Geometry based questions. There were 3-4 questions each from Matrices & Determinants, Functions, Inequalities, and Logarithm. Most of these questions were moderate to difficult or difficult. There were two questions of Probability of which one was easy and one was moderate to difficult. Questions (1 each) on Remainder, Simple Interest and Compound Interest, Surds and Indices were easy. Questions on Mixtures, Linear Equation (infinite solution), Time Speed and Distance (all data in terms of variable), Quadratic equations where roots were in GP, Area of an equation involving modulus, Mensuration, and Circle were moderate to difficult. There were two questions on Set Theory, of which 1 was easy and the other was moderate.

This section was a little difficult as compared to last year but again it was easy to attempt 12-15 questions if selection of questions was proper. Some of the questions were on mixed applications of concepts. Thus attempts in this section will go down as compared to last year.

Surprisingly, questions from basic arithmetic were negligible. There was one question on Time, Speed & Distance. No direct question from topics like Numbers, Percentages, Ratio or Time & Work would have surely put students under tremendous pressure.

There was one Data Interpretation set on Bar Graph which was lengthy. All questions were on basic concepts like Percentages, Ratio, and Averages. This compensated the deficit as mentioned above. But here students would have found it difficult to comprehend the data since they had to scroll vertically as well horizontally. Overall this section can be surely considered as tough. Ideal attempts in 40 minutes would be 15+ and good score can be 12+ net correct or a raw score of 48+.

Section 3: Verbal Ability

Total questions: 40
Duration: 40 Minutes

There were two passages having 6 and 7 questions respectively. The first passage was on the relationship between gender and mental capacity and the second one highlighted the importance of team efforts and maintaining secrecy. There were one or two questions about the purpose of the author behind a particular statement whereas rest of the questions in both the passages were either direct or inference based. Ideally, both these passages could have been attempted in close to 15 minutes.

A similar weightage was given to questions based on the application of Vocabulary. This was not surprising as except for 2017, Vocabulary has been a dominant subsection in Verbal Ability. This year again, there were around 13 questions divided into the following types of questions: Cloze Test (Fill in the Blanks), Word usage and Phrasal Verbs (Fill in the Blanks). The options in Cloze Test were slightly confusing. However, the same was not the case with Word Usage based questions, as the options could be eliminated more easily. Students were required to identify inappropriate usage of words (like right, write and rite) among the given sentences. There were about 7 Grammar-based questions. All grammar questions were asked in the same format, i.e., some part of a sentence was underlined and the right manner of phrasing it had to be identified. These questions can be considered moderate. Logical Continuation and Para-jumbles had 3 questions each. The difficulty level of Logical Continuation questions, with questions that had the first or the last sentence deleted from a paragraph, can be considered moderate. Para-jumbles were non-MCQ (2 questions with 4 sentences, 1 question with 5 sentences), making them slightly more difficult.

Overall, we can say that this section was similar to that of last year i.e., Moderate in level of difficulty, hence, good attempts this year should be 32+ and with approximately 80% accuracy, we can estimate the good score to be 24-25 net correct or a raw score of 96-100+.

SYNOPSIS:

Section	Good Attempts	Good Score	Cut-off Score
Verbal Ability	32+	100+	88+
Quantitative Aptitude (MCQ)	15+	48+	34+
Quantitative Aptitude (Short Answer)	9+	24+	20+
Overall (RAW score)	56+	172+	150+