CAT still down with ‘viral’,five labs shut in city

Prometric,the US firm conducting the exams,said “new appointments” have been generated for the candidates.

Ramesh Nava,Prometric Vice-President and General Manager,(Asia Pacific,Japan and Africa),said: “Exhaustive plans were developed and put in place well in advance. Unfortunately,the viruses that attacked the test delivery system were not detected by the anti-virus software at the testing centres.”

Prometric technicians have been dispatched to address these isolated problems,a spokesperson said.

The students,meanwhile,are keeping their fingers crossed.

Jaya Kumar,who had to appear for the exam on Sunday,is keeping his fingers crossed. A BTech final year student at IP University,Kumar said: “Colleges schedule their exam dates in accordance with the CAT. With cancellation of the exam today,I fear a clash of dates.”

His centre was at the Asia Pacific Institute of Management in Jasola,South Delhi.

Others suffer from a similar predicament.

“I received an e-mail from Prometrics yesterday,which said my appointment for today has been cancelled,” said Ravi Verma from the same centre.

Those who were able to take the exam,however,were not too happy. While some complained that the exam started late,others said the computer terminals had to be rebooted more than once.

Avinash Patnaik,whose centre was at Apeejay School of Management at Dwarka Sector 8,said: “The exam was supposed to start at 10 am but mine started at 11 am. Some even started at 11.15 am. At times the validation code was not being accepted and the proctors no clue what was happening.”

“We understand how stressful it is for candidates to adapt to this new computer-based format,” said Soumitra Roy,Prometric Managing Director,India.

“We truly regret the additional stress and are doing everything we can to make the rest of the testing experience as smooth as possible.”