Common Law Entrance Exams (CLAT) 2013 was conducted by Hidayatullah National Law University, Raipur on May 12, 2013. Approximately 30,000 students appeared for CLAT examination across the country to compete for about 2,500 seats being offered by top 20 law universities. The CLAT 2013 result was declared on May 31, 2013.

While some time has passed, this article may be helpful to understand the ethics of the CLAT question paper and will probably help future aspirants of CLAT.

The CLAT 2013 paper came almost along the expected lines as mentioned in the CLAT notification regarding the pattern of test, unlike last year when many aspirants were led astray/caught off-guard by the actual exam. The difficulty level was relatively lower.
 

Total no. of questions: 200
Total time: 2 hours
Overall expected attempts: 149-160

Overall Difficulty: The level of difficulty of this paper was Easy-Moderate.

• English: This section of CLAT 2013 was not too different from the English section of previous year’s iteration. There was one Reading Comprehension passage, followed by 10 questions, two of which were synonym-based. The passage was on the evolution of education and the questions were relatively easy as they could easily be answered by referring to the body of the passage. Like last year, there were 5 questions each on Idioms, Para-Jumbles and Foreign Language Phrases. The Latin phrase ‘carte blanche’ was reproduced exactly from the 2012 paper. In grammar, contrary to the notification, no questions involved Sentence Correction/Spot the Error, however, as mentioned therein, there were 10 Fill in the Blanks questions based on prepositions. Overall, the level of difficulty of this section was easy to moderate.
   
• Logical Reasoning: This section should not have posed any problems for the aspirants as the level of difficulty was low. Breaking away from tradition, mathematical concepts played an important role. The entire section was dominated by Analytical Reasoning. There were 15 questions on Arrangements, and 5 questions each on Series, Blood Relationships, Syllogisms, Course of Action, and Analogy.
   
• Elementary Mathematics: This section of the paper had 20 questions. Most of the questions were straightforward and required application of the basic concepts to arrive at the correct answer. This section was mainly focused on questions from Geometry, Mensuration and Arithmetic, and most of the questions were from topics like percentages, profit, loss and discount, ratio & proportion, time, speed and distance, time and work, area, circles etc. There were about 3 - 4 questions each from Algebra and Number System. One question each was asked from Set Theory, Statistics and Probability. An attempt of 12 - 13 questions is an ideal one. There were at least a couple of questions here which did not have the right answer as any of the options.
   
• General Knowledge: The General Knowledge section in this year’s paper was almost at par with 2012 CLAT. It had a healthy mixture of Current Affairs and Static General Knowledge questions, with slightly more number of questions concerning Current Affairs. Legal General Knowledge covered the 117th Amendment and the number of High Courts in India. One question in General Science was repeated from last year’s paper, and there were lesser questions from this topic than the previous year. The couple of questions from History were a little tough. Questions testing knowledge of Personalities, World Days and International Organizations constituted the rest of the section. A good attempt would be about 35-36 questions, while an attempt of over 40 questions would be exceptional.
   
• Legal Aptitude: It was ambiguous whether the Legal Aptitude Section would have Legal Knowledge questions or not, but as a relief, they were absent from the paper. The questions were based on legal principles such as contracts covering promissory estoppel, postal rule, and cross offer. The questions on torts included topics like liability, nuisance, and negligence. Criminal law was also given due importance, covering topics like theft and kidnapping. Constitution included one question on Fundamental Rights, and one on State. One question was on family law. International law was conspicuous by absence, while knowledge of IPR was tested on copyright, trademarks and licenses. CL students would not have faced any problems due to their familiarity with the material and mocks, enabling them to achieve a respectable score in this section. There were not less than four questions which were taken verbatim from CLAT 2012.

Estimated Cut-offs for Different Law Schools

The estimated cut-offs provided below are subject to minor variations of +/- 5 marks.

• Tier I Law Schools: 134-139
• Tier II Law Schools: 130-134
• Tier III Law Schools: 124-130

Due to the comparatively easier paper this year, the range of scores that will ensure admission to premier law schools will be much narrower, resulting in more intense competition for the few precious seats up for grabs. In case of a tie, the Legal Aptitude Section would be the deciding factor (as given on the CLAT website).

Tagged in MAT MAT test pattern MAT exam AIMA MAT exam structure

Like us on :