At the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad , it was recorded that most of the students who used to take admission in the postgraduate programme for management at the Institute were from the engineering background. However, this trend of students from the engineering background taking admission into the PG programmes at IIM has changed. With the efforts put in by the institute in bringing about diversity in the students at IIM, it was seen in 2018-20 batch, that most of the students who had taken admission had risen to 33% from 5% from the 2011-13 batch.
The 2011-13 batch at IIM Ahmedabad consisted of a total of 331 students in the PG programme. Out of the total number of students, only 17 students, which comes to be around 5% of the students, had been from a background other than engineering. In the same batch, the number of female students 11% of the total number of students. According to a recent survey undertaken by IIM-A, the number of students belonging to a different background than engineering had risen to 33% for the 2018-20 batch. In fact, the previous batch of 2017-19 had 32% of the students from a different academic background.
Professor Erol D’Souza, the director of the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad had stated that the institute had been trying to increase the diversity in students in the PGP batch this year. He further added that they have made changes in the entrance examinations to allow for students from different background to enter IIM Ahmedabad. He states that they have been working on bringing more and more students from different academic backgrounds to enhance the ratio at the institute. He also stated that if a student is a topper in any field from any university, then they will be called for an interview at the institute. He added that if such a student displayed certain characteristics such as curiousness and steadfastness, then there is a high chance that the student will be admitted to the Institute.
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Prof. D’Souza also stated that the gender ratio at Institute had increased. He stated, in comparison to the batch of 2011-13, more women have enrolled themselves into the management courses at IIM Ahmedabad.
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The Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad is not the only IIM which is trying to include more students from various academic backgrounds. The Common Admission Test or CAT, Pro. D’Souza stated, has been readjusted so that such students are able to take admission at IIMs all across India.