The Institute of Banking Personnel Selection (IBPS) conducted Online Preliminary Examination for the recruitment of Specialist Officers across the country on December 30, 2017.
There were 150 questions in the paper, which had to be answered in 120 minutes. There were three sections in all - English Language, Reasoning and Quantitative Aptitude. All the other sections except English Language section were available bilingually, that is, in both English and Hindi. Each question had 5 options. There was negative marking of one-fourth of the marks assigned to that question for all the sections.
The pattern of the test was as follows:
| Section |
Total Questions |
Max. Marks |
Level of Difficulty |
Possible Attempts |
Time allotted for each section (In Minutes) |
|
English Language |
50 |
25 |
Difficult |
26 - 30 |
35 minutes |
|
Reasoning |
50 |
50 |
Easy to Moderate |
35 - 38 |
40 minutes |
|
Quantitative Aptitude |
50 |
50 |
Easy to Moderate |
34 - 37 |
45 minutes |
|
Total |
150 |
125 |
Moderate |
95 - 105 |
120 minutes |
This section primarily saw questions which were easy-moderate in nature. Some of the questions were time consuming. Still, a candidate could have easily attempted at least 25 questions with good accuracy.
This year, there was a set based on 8 boxes having different shapes are to be arranged in different floors. The other sets were based on Circular arrangement and 8 erasers of different colours were arranged in a stack one over the other.Topic |
Number of questions |
Level of difficulty |
Circular Seating Arrangement (8 people with books arrangement) |
5 |
Moderate |
Linear Seating Arrangement (facing North -South direction owns different cars) |
5 |
Moderate |
Linear Data Arrangement (people sitting facing North) |
2 |
Easy |
Linear Arrangement (3 variables based) |
5 |
Difficult |
Data Arrangement (8 erasers having different colours are one over the other in a stack) |
5 |
Easy- Moderate |
Finding odd one among the given letters |
1 |
Easy |
Counting of letters acc to English Dictionary(Word was “INVESTOR”) |
1 |
Easy |
Syllogism |
5 |
Easy |
Direction |
5 |
|
Mathematical Inequality |
5 |
Easy |
Statement Assumption |
1 |
Easy- Moderate |
Statement Courses of Action |
3 |
Moderate |
Coding-Decoding |
2 |
Easy |
Data Sufficiency (Based on Directions, Coding Decoding) |
2 |
Easy- Moderate |
Data Arrangement(6 cities having different no of lakes |
3 |
Easy |
The questions in this section were difficult in nature due to the appearance of new types of questions. Therefore, a candidate should have attempted around 20 questions with good accuracy to stay safe.
Questions based on "rearrangement and error-finding" appeared in new patterns. In Rearrangement, first sentence was given and rest 4 sentences have to be arranged to form a paragraph”. Similarly, the questions based on finding the errors were quite difficult too as a set of four sentences were given and any two sentences had errors together”. Apart from these topics, there were questions based on Reading Comprehension, Cloze Test and Phrase replacement as well.
Topic |
Number of questions |
Level of difficulty |
Reading Comprehension (Based on Infrastructure of different countries) |
8 |
Difficult |
2nd Passage |
7 |
Difficult |
Rearrangement to form a paragraph |
5 |
Moderate-Difficult |
Cloze Test |
10 |
Moderate-Difficult |
Phrase Replacement |
8 |
Moderate |
Spot the Error(two sentences have errors together) |
7 |
Moderate |
Fill in the Blanks |
5 |
Moderate |
The difficulty level of questions in this section was easy to moderate because most of the questions were conventional in nature. A candidate could have easily attempted at least 35 questions with good accuracy.
The questions were, basically, based on Number Series, Arithmetic, Quadratic Equation, Data Interpretation and Approximation.
Topic |
Number of questions |
Level of difficulty |
Comparison of Variables |
6 |
Easy |
Profit, Loss and Discount |
1 |
Easy |
Percentage |
1 |
Easy |
Simple Interest / Compound Interest |
1 |
Moderate |
Boat and Stream |
1 |
Moderate |
Time and Work |
1 |
Moderate |
Series - Next Number |
6 |
Easy- Moderate |
Mixture and Alligation |
1 |
Moderate |
Data given in the form of a paragraph |
5 |
Moderate |
Average |
1 |
Easy |
Mensuration |
1 |
Easy |
Data Interpretation (Pie chart) |
5 |
Easy |
Data Interpretation (Bar Graph) |
5 |
Easy |
Data Interpretation (Table based) |
5 |
Easy |
Approximation |
8 |
Easy |
Probability |
1 |
Easy |
Age based |
1 |
Easy |
Disclaimer: All information on cut-offs, analysis, answer key and scores are based on independent analysis and evaluation made by Career Launcher. We do not take responsibility for any decision that might be taken, based on this information.
All the best!
Team CL