Of the 362 students in the class of 2012, 309 students are in the PGDM course and 53 in PGDCM.The percentage of women in the batch is 12%, up from 10% last year. This batch includes 32 overseas candidates who have been admitted through the GMAT examination, while the rest of the students have been admitted through CAT. The number of overseas candidates has increased considerably compared to last year, when there were only 19 overseas candidates. Overseas candidates are typically students who have completed their undergraduation in various parts of the world, or have worked outside the country for a considerable amount of time and have decided to come to IIM Calcutta to pursue their management studies in India.

The number of students with prior work-experience has increased from 63% last year to 67% this year. The average work experience is 20 months.There is considerable diversity in the nature of work experience, with candidates having previously worked in NGOs, public sector companies, Indian armed services, consulting firms, healthcare firms, IT firms and in education. There are students who have worked as Scientists, teachers and in positions as senior as Operations head, while there are around 15 entrepreneurs who have started their own businesses.

The 2010-12 batch consists of a majority of engineers, as is usual in IIM Calcutta. This year, 91% of the batch comprises of engineers. This is less than last year’s ratio of 94% engineers. Within engineering, there are students from diverse streams like aeronautical engineering, Agricultural and food engineering, biomedical engineering, Fibre and Textile processing and aerospace engineering.

While a large part of the engineers are from institutes like the IITs and NITs in the country, this year, there are students from various universities around the world, like The Pennsylvania State University, Purdue University, University of Maryland, University of New Brunswick, Canada, University of Adelaide, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore and University of Melbourne.

Apart from engineers, the batch consists of doctors, economists, naval architects, botanists, accountants and scientists. There are also students who have graduated in history, education, journalism and political science.