India

If you want to become a management consultant at MBB firms, you have to get into IIM A, B or C. They mostly don't go to other colleges in India. It's very difficult to get into IIM A, B, and C for a general category student or may be even an IIT or XLRI for that matter. Only students with a 99.8% and above get calls from A, B, C. Every year, the pattern changes for CAT. For an MBA abroad, you have to have at least 4 years of work ex. The culture there does an MBA only if they need one and only after working for at least 6 years. There is no concept of campus placements there. They have job fairs. For this reason many freshers opt for an MS over an MBA because without work ex they will mostly not get selected by a good MBA college. More over MBAs in the US or UK cost a lot. In some cases many times over an MS degree in the same country. If you don't find a job soon you might have to come back home when your student visa expires. At the end of the day even at these interviews for admission in Indian colleges you have to justify why you would want to do an MBA, how it is related to your work ex etc. For freshers like you, unless you are very clear and have a very high percentage, you won't be able to justify properly compared to a person with work ex. So I suggest you work for a couple of years. Don't quit your job like me and study for CAT because the test is unpredictable and you are not guaranteed to score a high % all the time. It's touch and go. People score that high because they write it every year or are simply hard working. If your goal is to do an MBA in a good Indian college, go for colleges with a brand name. It's a balance between three factors. The college brand, the course scope and the placements. ROI in the long run does not matter if you are happy with what you want to do in life. Reservation has made it difficult for us general category students to succeed. In my opinion reservation should be based on the economic status of the family. They have separate GD rounds and cutoffs for reserved candidates. Sometimes even no cutoffs. Deserving students don't get a seat. First decide what you want to do in life and why? Choose the branch you want to pursue. Choose the college next but settle for only those colleges that have a good brand name. If you want to do investment banking and other such things, the industry in India is premature. If not IIM A, B, C you might have to study at Singapore where it is cheaper than most places in the West.