MUMBAI: With steeply growing number of MBA applicants each year, NMAT by Graduate Management Admission Council (earlier called the NMIMS Management Aptitude Test) has seen a 15% jump in number of applications. With CAT 2015 also registering the highest ever number of applications, the growing demand of MBA degree is clearly visible.
A total of 54000 candidates have already registered for the NMAT till Monday, as against 46950 last year. Of these 38% are females, up by 2% against prior year. 20 transgenders have also filled in their candidature for the test. Non-engineering applicants constitute 43% of the total applicants, of whom 22% belong to commerce background, 11% from management, 5% from science and 3% from arts. The fact that there has been a rise of applications from lesser known portions of the country like Andaman, Manipur, Lakshadweep and Nagaland is highly praiseworthy. The maximum number of applications have come from Maharashtra, followed by Delhi and Uttar Pradesh.
Vikram Shah, Director Product Management GMAC, said that along with NMIMS, 15 other institutes shall also use the NMAT scores this year to give admissions. Since the inception of NMAT, there has been a significant rise in the number of applications, he pointed out.
Anant Rastogi, Director Marketing - South Asia, NMAT by GMAC said that the focus on inviting female participation has been significant this year. Of the total of 16 institutes using NMAT for admissions, one is a women's college. With the focus programmes, many other women colleges were also approached. Though the rise in applications seems a mere 2%, but it quantifies to an additional 1600 female applications this year., he added.
The percentage of fresher applications is a whopping 55%, which is a clear indication of the fact that students want to acquire their master degree right after graduation. The remaining candidates have a work experience varying between 1-20 years. Interestingly, there are 180 candidates with a work experience of more than 20 years.