The seminar will be the first in the Idea series based on the theme of Marketing in the Time of Recession.

Management expert Dr CS Venkata Ratnam, Director of New Delhi based International Management Institute answers questions posed by our readers on his Ask Venkat column on MBAUniverse.com. Dr Venkata Ratnam responded many questions of Hundreds of students, executives and managers from India and overseas which helped them to choose better options in their management education.Dr Ratnam recently offered his advice on queries of working executives and students who want to do Ex-MBA from IIMS and Distance MBA. Here are some questions:

The event was organised by the institute in collaboration with Concern Worldwide a voluntary non-governmental organisation involved in implementing emergency and development programmes in 30 countries across the globe. The event was inaugurated by Mr. Nikunja K. Sundaray, IAS, Special Relief Commissioner and Managing Director, Orissa State Disaster Management Authority.

The programme noticed the participation of 26 senior and middle level managers working in various government and non-governmental organisations in India, Nepal and Bangladesh.

SPJIMR participants won the final contest beating a team from IIT-Delhi, which was the runner-up, followed by IIM-B who finished at third position.
The team from SPJIMR, comprising of Aditya Gupta and Harish Sridharan, first year participants in the PGDM course, overcame stiff competition. SPJIMR, who were the representatives of Mumbai zone, took on the other zone winners, IIM-Ahmedabad, IIM-Bangalore, IIT-Delhi and IISWB (Kolkatta zone).

There are 120 seats in the MBA programme and the admission is through the GBUs entrance exam, to be held on April 5. There are 120 seats offered for the programme with specialization in Finance, Marketing, IT, Retail, Operations, Strategy, Insurance, etc.Candidates who have passed their graduation from a recognized university securing minimum 50% marks are eligible to apply for the MBA programme.

The event was organised by Loyola Institute of Business Administration (LIBA) and the University of Dayton, Ohio, USA, on February 2, 2009.

Debanjan scored 246 out of 356. As a result, he has received Group Discussion and Personal Interview (GD/PIs) calls from six Indian Institute of Management (IIMs) -- IIM Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Calcutta, Indore, Lucknow and Kozhikode.

MBAUniverse.com spoke to Debanjan to know the success mantras behind this big achievement.

Q: How does it feel getting 100 percentile in CAT 08?
A: Yes. It is a good feeling! It is really a big achievement for me. I made it just because of my hard work.

Q: How did you prepare for CAT 09? What was your preparation strategy?

This information was shared by Wg Cdr VS Bejoy (Retd), Director, Centre for Management Services (CMS) with MBAUniverse.com soon after the exam. Over 350 MAT allied colleges participated in this round of MAT, which is held four times in a year.
The paper was scheduled for 150 minutes and had a total of 200 multiple choice answers questions. Overall level of difficulty of the paper was moderate to easy, although the difficulty level of GK questions was higher than the December 2008 MAT.

How do experts from leading test prep companies include Career Launcher and PT Education analyze the test paper? MBAUniverse.com presents MAT analysis by Career Launcher and Mr Sandeep Manudhane, Founder Chairman, PT Education.

MAT February 2009 AnalysisBy Career Launcher