NMAT 2017 (2pm-4pm – 11th Oct) spun no real surprise as far as the difficulty level was concerned. The paper stuck to a predictable pattern question wise. There were three sections with no negative marking. A student had the choice of deciding the sequence of sections. There were no technical glitches and the experience was quite pleasant.
Compared to last year, the Language Skills section was slightly easier while the Logical Reasoning section and the Quantitative Skills section were of moderate level of difficulty.
A well-prepared candidate should have attempted 95-100 questions while guessing the remaining in the allotted time. Students aiming for a 99+ in CAT should have ideally been able to solve 105+ questions. However, the difficulty level didn’t vary drastically. Anyone with poor reading speed would have faced a tough challenge due to the strict sectional time constraint. As always, solid strategy was the need of the hour.
Basis our experience, irrespective of the level of difficulty of the NMAT paper, the cut-off hovers around 207-209 marks due to normalization. This year should be no different. Suggested attempt strategy would be Logical Reasoning followed by Quantitative Skills followed by Language Skills.
The pattern of the paper was as follows:
S. no |
Section |
No. of Questions |
Time (in Minutes) |
Difficulty Level |
Serious Attempts |
1 |
Language Skills |
32 |
22 |
Easy-Moderate |
24-26 |
2 |
Quantitative Skills |
48 |
60 |
Moderate |
33-35 |
3 |
Logical Reasoning |
40 |
38 |
Easy-moderate |
35-37 |
|
Total |
120 |
120 |
Easy-Moderate |
92+ |
The Logical Reasoning section was easy-moderate
The Analytical Reasoning questions were from predictable areas. The questions were very easy. The one LR sets was moderate and slightly time consuming. Students would have done well to work with options rather than solve the sets from scratch. The singlets were pretty easy. In a slight change from 7th Oct, the input and output set was moderate rather than easy.
There were 16 questions from the area of Verbal Logic. The five Critical Reasoning questions were of moderate-advance level of difficulty. In a couple of the questions the options were very close and a student would have needed a thorough understanding of the concepts of Critical Reasoning to attempt these correctly. There were three syllogism based questions and these were easy. The remaining questions in verbal logic ranged from easy to moderate level of difficulty.
Overall, as compared to last year, this section was easier. An attempt of 30-32 with 85% accuracy was achievable.
Topic |
No. of Questions |
Level of difficulty |
Coding |
4 |
Moderate |
Blood Relation |
2 |
Easy |
Critical Reasoning |
5 |
Moderate- difficult |
Statement-Argument |
2 |
Moderate |
Statement Conclusion |
2 |
Easy- moderate |
Course of Action / Decision making |
2 |
Easy- moderate |
Statement-Assumption |
2 |
Easy |
Syllogism |
3 |
Easy |
Logical Reasoning(arrangements) |
8 (2 sets, 4 questions each) |
Easy |
Input/output |
4 (1 set) |
Moderate |
Diagram Based (Find the missing number) |
2 |
Easy-moderate |
Mathematical Puzzles & Direction |
2 |
Easy |
Singlets (Contained Visual Reasoning and Set theory based diagram) |
2 |
Easy |
Total |
40 |
Easy-moderate |
The Quantitative Skills section was of moderate level. Arithmetic dominated the section. Number system, too, made its presence felt. The Data Sufficiency questions were from diverse topics such as Numbers, Time Speed and Distance, Percentage and Geometry. The questions from Modern Maths (P&C, Probability) were very easy and anyone, even without any Maths background, could have solved these. The TSD questions were time consuming. The Time and Work questions were easy.
There were 5 DI sets with 4 questions each. Which included pie-chart, 2 sets on combination graph, bar graph and a set comprising two tables. Three of these sets were calculation intensive. The remaining 2 were easy. A well-prepared student would not have had much difficulty in going through this section. 35-37 proper attempts were certainly possible.
Topic |
No. of Questions |
Level of difficulty |
Profit & Loss |
2 |
Easy |
Percentages |
1 |
Easy-moderate |
Ratio & Proportion |
2 |
Easy-moderate |
SI |
1 |
Easy |
Time, Speed & Distance |
1 |
moderate |
Work & Time |
2 |
Easy-moderate |
Number System |
5 |
Easy-Moderate |
Progression |
1 |
Easy-moderate |
Logarithm |
1 |
Easy-moderate |
Quadratic equation |
1 |
Moderate-difficult |
Geometry |
1 |
Easy-Moderate |
Mensuration |
2 |
Moderate |
P & C / Probability |
2 |
Easy |
Data Sufficiency |
6 |
Moderate |
DI |
20 (5 sets, 4 questions each) |
Moderate |
Total |
48 |
Moderate |
Unlike day 1 only 3 out of 8 questions were inference/idea based thus, the RCs were overall much easier than on day 1 and could have been solved in 8-9 minutes combined. The five vocabulary questions were of easy-moderate level of difficulty. The Fill in the blank, and Para Jumble questions were moderate to difficult. The options were, as usual, very close in the Para Jumble questions. The spot the error questions in Grammar covered mostly Tenses and Parallelism. There were the four usual FIB with prepositions questions. The Cloze test was based on Vocabulary and had very close options.
The pattern of this section remained on predictable lines. Overall, the section was of moderate level of difficulty keeping in mind the time constraint. An overall attempt of 26-28 with 80% accuracy is realistic. The other questions could have been educated guesswork.
Topic |
No. of Questions |
Level of difficulty |
Reading Comprehension Passages |
8 (2 passages of 4 questions each) |
Easy-moderate |
Para Jumble |
4(3-4 sentence, 1 – 5 sentence) |
Easy |
Error Spotting |
4 |
Easy-moderate |
FIBs (Prepositions) |
4 (1 blank each – 3 sentences) |
Easy |
FIBs (Vocabulary) |
4 (2 blanks each) |
Moderate |
Synonyms |
2 |
Easy |
Antonym |
3 |
Difficult |
Analogy |
1 |
Moderate |
Cloze Test |
2 (vocab based) |
Difficult |
Total |
32 |
Moderate |
The overall difficulty level of the paper was moderate and guess work would not have been needed for more than 20% of the paper.
TEAM CL