This is the most asked question to me and it would be unfair if I give a short and generic answer for this question. To answer this question, I have to take the following assumptions:

1. Aspirants are preparing from scratch.
2. Aspirants have not appeared for any MBA exam like CAT/XAT/IIFT, etc.
3. Aspirants haven't been in touch with studies for a long time.

Based on these assumptions and the recent difficulty levels, the maximum time you can take to complete the PGDBA syllabus efficiently is 450 man hours. These man hours include concepts, practice, and mocks. I have converted this into man hours to remove the complexities like if a candidate is working or a student. For a working candidate with 6 days a week of workload, this would translate into 2 hours on weekdays and 6 hours on Sunday for roughly 6 months. 6 months might sound like a lot but the point to understand here is I have assumed that you are starting from absolute basics with the worst-case scenario. In my experience of 5 years, on average, candidates take 250-300 man hours to completely prepare for the exam. One can increase or decrease the daily hours to increase/decrease the speed based on the situation. I hope this will be helpful for everyone who is planning to prepare for PGDBA 2025. You can refer to the detailed syllabus and free resources from here.

PGDBA exam is significantly easier as compared to CAT in terms of overall difficulty. What do I mean by overall difficulty? It considers every factor while comparing. Let's dive deep into the discussion. We will compare both the exams in terms of 4 variables.

1. Syllabus: If we talk about VARC, then syllabus of CAT is much more complicated and significantly tougher than PGDBA VARC. Same goes for DILR. But for Quant, CAT's syllabus is easier as compared to PGDBA. Total amount of syllabus is more or less similar for both exams. So the conclusion is, in terms of syllabus difficulty, we can say that both the exams are more or less at the same level.
2. Sectional time and sequence: There is no sectional time in PGDBA and you can spend time according to your strengths and weaknesses. Whereas in CAT, you have to follow the sequence and every section is time-bound making it tougher in this aspect as compared to PGDBA.
3. Sectional cutoff: Again, there is no sectional cutoff in PGDBA but it is there in CAT, making it tougher as compared to PGDBA exam.
4. Number of questions: Number of questions are significantly higher in CAT (66 for 2 hours) whereas we just have 50 questions for 3 hours in PGDBA. This again makes CAT tougher as compared to PGDBA.

Based on the 4 variables discussed, we can safely say that in terms of overall difficulty, CAT is tougher as compared to PGDBA.

Educational Background:

• You must have a Bachelor's degree (B.Tech., B.E., M.Sc., M.Com. or equivalent) with at least 60% marks or a CGPA of 6.5 on a 10-point scale. One-year MBA programs are not considered equivalent.
• OR You can have a Diploma in Engineering (10 + 3 years) followed by a lateral entry into B.E./B.Tech. (3 years) with a minimum 60% marks or a CGPA of 6.5 on a 10-point scale in your final degree (B.Tech./B.E.).
• OR You can have a B.Sc. degree (10 + 2 + 4 years) with at least 60% marks or a CGPA of 6.5 on a 10-point scale in your final degree (B.Sc.).
• OR You can be a qualified CA (Chartered Accountant), CS (Company Secretary) or ICWA (Institute of Cost Accountants) with a minimum of 60% marks in both Intermediate and Final examinations combined.

Candidates from SC/ST and Person with Disabilities (PwD) categories can apply with a minimum of 55% marks or a CGPA of 6.0 on a 10-point scale.

CGPA Conversion:

• Your CGPA in transcript will be used directly for eligibility assessment and it will not be converted into percentage regardless if the awarding university provides marks as well.
• If your CGPA is on a different scale than 10, the university will assess your eligibility based on an equivalent CGPA on a 10-point scale.

Final Year Students:

• Students in their final year of a qualifying program can apply provided they complete their degree and meet all other requirements by June 30th, 2025. (Tentative date)
• Admission for such students will be provisional, subject to submission of the final mark sheet by November 30th, 2025. (Tentative date)

This again, is one of the most asked questions to me and that too every single year, all thanks to biased opinions on Quora. But is it really true? Let's break it down.

If we talk about pre-covid days, then yes, it was true as 75% of the batch was basically filled with IIT, NIT and BITS graduates (including both working and freshers). But data points have changed post-covid. Recent PGDBA batch (PGDBA 2023) has 49% from IIT/NIT/BITS and 51% from other colleges. 49% may still seem like a lot, however, if we consider one more data point, then it would change your perspective.

For majority of us, JEE has not been a sweet experience. Those who couldn't clear it earlier are significantly reluctant to study for PGDBA as it has similar maths syllabus. Majority of the candidates who drop the PGDBA preparation are not from IIT/NIT/BITS. It might be a hard pill to swallow, but this is what I have seen in past 5 years. Also, I have collected candidate-wise data every single year and can see that there are usually more number of candidates from IIT/NIT/BITS. Now with all this information, don't you think candidates from these colleges are having a bit of disadvantage rather than the popular opinion on Quora? Aspiring data scientists should believe data and not opinions.

Almost every fresher we have encountered has asked this question. The answer to this question involves two data points. First one is what percentage of applicants are freshers in PGDBA and second one is what percentage of batch are freshers. Surprisingly, both numbers are exactly same, and not just for freshers, for every work experience category, this number is the same. So if you are a fresher, your competition is with peer freshers and not with experienced ones. Thus, everyone is having equal chances of getting selected if we are talking about PGDBA.

From 2020 to 2022, candidates from analytics/coding background had a percentage of less than 15% in the batch. In 2023 and 2024, their percentage increased to 35%. Also, since a lot of aspirants are those who want a switch from core industrial experience to data science, PGDBA participants are likely to be lesser from analytics background and thus the smaller percentage in the batch. Based on 5 years of our experience, we can say for sure that everything boils down to your PGDBA exam score and your interview skills. Other data points are mostly noise.

Yes, you should prepare for PGDBA exam even with a gap year. We haven't got any candidate who was purely grilled and rejected just because he/she had a gap year. As long as candidates show genuine interest in analytics, good maths & stats skills and good problem-solving skills in the interview, gap year hardly matters to the panelists.

Strong NO!! NCERT is not at all enough to completely prepare for PGDBA exam maths. It used to be enough during earlier days of PGDBA when competition was less and scores were lesser. Since 2021, syllabus has expanded beyond NCERT, both in terms of toughness and number of concepts. You won't be able to solve more than 70% of maths paper if you are preparing through NCERT. A lot of people score full marks in PGDBA maths every year and to compete with them, you need much more than NCERT.