The Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Kozhikode  has sprung a huge surprise in its admissions process for the 2011-2013 Post Graduate Program in Management (PGPM) batch. Deviating from the past, this year the b-school has initiated a lengthier three-tier admission process. Of which the first stage has just concluded, in which the  b-school has sent call emails to everyone with an overall CAT 2010 percentile of just 75 in the general category and a minimum of 55 percentile each of the three sections — Quantitative Ability, Verbal Ability and Data Interpretation. About 30,000 candidates — or over 14 percent of those who registered for CAT 2010 — have received this email so far. The cut-off for the OBC category is 65 percentile.

Candidates have been asked to register online in the first stage and fill in additional particulars about themselves, down to the details of their marks in every year of their graduation and post-graduation. The last day to register is January 21, 2011.

This email however comes with a disclaimer that “The registration at this stage does not guarantee an interview call”.

When asked, an official from the admissions department at IIM Kozhikode told that this was only the first stage and by the time the second shortlist was out, the number will be ten times lower. “The first stage is only the data collection stage. We initiated this process since the last year quite a few students told us that they had not filled in their academic scores with Prometric, which is why we could not contact them in the initial stage. After we collect this data, we will then decide the calls for the next stage,” said the official.

The official said that the changed admission process would continue to use merit as its basis.

However, the official added that there was a move to admit a ‘diverse’ batch. But the process will not favour a particular group (engineers, women, etc) over others. “We have a transparent process and like to admit on merit and not because anybody falls in a particular group,” he said.

This year, past academics, primarily class X and XII scores will also be given additional weightage. “If we are stressing on something, it is academics,” said the official.

During the second stage, an index score will be computed with 50% weight for the overall CAT score, 20% weight for academic performance in class X, 20% weight for class XII and 10% to graduation scores. The academic performance of secondary school as well as higher secondary school will be taken as the percentage of marks reported by the candidates and will be standardised across various boards of education and streams (arts, commerce, science) using the data available with IIM Kozhikode for four years including the current year. In each category, the top ranking candidates based on this index score will be called for the personal interview process. Those shortlisted will have to register once again.

The third stage of the process will be based on a composite score of various elements. About 30% weightage will be given to the index score arrived at on stage 2. For the extempore essay, the weightage will be 20% while the personal interview will carry 35%. 15% will be accorded for the profile of the candidate.

From an outer perspective, the move to call in 75 percentilers from CAT 2010 seems to have pacified thousands of CAT-takers who feel that they have lost out because of normalisation and psychometrics, the two closed-door processes used by IIMs while marking students. Candidates hope this move will take them at least a level closer to their dream of making it to an IIM.