St Xavier’s University will conduct admissions to its MBA course for the 2020 academic session online because of the coronavirus outbreak.

Group discussions and personal interviews to screen aspiring students will be held using various virtual platforms, Father Felix Raj, vice-chancellor of the university, said on Saturday.

Online group discussions and personal interviews will start on Sunday. “The admission process consisting of group discussions, personal interviews and tests are being done online this time. A schedule has been announced to all applicants,” the vice-chancellor said.

After attending the group discussions and personal interviews, students will have to take an online written test, he said. The test will be different from the ones held in the previous years, he said.

Since the admission process will be held online, the question pattern of the written test and the group discussions and personal interviews will be “slightly different”, he said. But the basic requirement an aspiring candidate needs to fulfil for a management course will be examined even during the online admission process.

For every 50 applicants, a teacher has been assigned to oversee group discussions, interview sessions and written tests. Teachers will have to send the reports to the vice-chancellor.

The final selection will be done based on students’ performances in group discussions, personal interviews, written tests admission tests apart from their school academic records, a university official said.

The St Xavier’s University, modelled on XLRI Jamshedpur, started operating in 2018 with the first batch of MBA students. The B-school, which is part of the university's 17-acre campus in New Town, offers 120 seats in its MBA course. At least 400 students have applied for the MBA course this year.

The group discussions and personal interview sessions were originally scheduled to start from March 21.

The admission process had to be delayed because of the lockdown. 'We decided to conduct the MBA admissions online to avoid further delay,' the vice-chancellor said.

The new session of the two-year MBA course is scheduled to start from July.