Abandon Hope: An Elite Indian B-School's Wild Selectivity

If you’re pining to get into a selective MBA program and find the acceptance rates at Stanford (7 percent) and Harvard (13 percent) terrifying, here’s some perspective: Not even 1 percent of applicants were admitted to India’s top business school last year.

The Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad offered spots to only 0.25 percent of applicants for the 2012-14 academic period. Admission is based heavily on entrance exam scores. All applicants are required to take India’s Common Application Test, or CAT. Those who were admitted and also took the U.S.-based GMAT out-tested business students the world over: The average GMAT score for IIMA students was 767, compared with 730 at Stanford’s Graduate School of Business, the Times of India reported last month. Stanford is the most selective U.S. MBA program, according to Bloomberg Businessweek data.