IIM Sambalpur vs IIM Udaipur: The 85 Concession Against the 94 Invitation

Two solo doors, two opposite answers to the same question. IIM Sambalpur asks a flat 90 percentile — and drops it to 85 for every female candidate and every man with a year of relevant work experience, with no sectional cut-offs at all. IIM Udaipur asks 94 with 75 in every section, and only by invitation. Both policies were re-read today, 17 October 2026. One institute prints the fullest residential fee table in this series; the other prints no flagship fee at all.

The two bars, exactly as printed

	IIM Sambalpur (MBA 2026-28)	IIM Udaipur (16th batch, 2026-28)
General bar	90 overall — 85 for all female candidates and 1yr+ work-ex men	94 overall
Sectional cut-offs	None — a positive scaled score in each section suffices	75 / 75 / 75
EWS / NC-OBC	80 / 75	81 / 81 (55s / 52s sectional)
SC / ST	55 / 40	66 / 42
Process shape	Three stages; email link to the admission-portal form in January	Invitation-email registration after the CAT result, then shortlist
Batch	About 320	375 planned
Offer acceptance	Rs 50,000, adjusted against Term-1	Rs 1,00,000, adjusted in Term I

Read Udaipur’s 94 beside its sectionals: the 75/75/75 floor is the quiet gate that ends more applications than the headline number. Sambalpur’s 90-with-an-85 is the most concessional printed structure in the series — the concession is not a points bonus but a five-point lowering of the bar itself, and it covers every female candidate, not a handful.

The formulas: the work-experience institute against the CAT-score institute

Sambalpur’s Pre-PI score runs out of 75: CAT 40 (computed as 0.31 x overall percentile + 0.03 per section), Class X 3, Class XII 3, graduation 4, work experience 20, gender diversity 5. The work-experience table is the sharpest we have printed: zero below 12 months, 5 at 12, 10 at 18, 15 at 24, the full 20 at exactly 30 months, then declining to zero beyond 48, measured to 31 December 2025. The final merit keeps the same components out of 100 and adds the PI at 25.

Udaipur’s final is Normalised CAT Score 55% + Personal Interview 25% + Profile 20% — academic 6, work experience 6, diversity 8 — and the policy prints the sentence that settles a hundred forum arguments: the CAT Score would be used and not the CAT Percentile. Your raw score is measured against the best score among candidates who applied to IIMU and sat the PI. Work experience counts to 31 January 2026, and the no-credit list (internships, article-ship, cash/UPI-paid work) is printed verbatim.

The bills: the fullest table in the series against no table at all

Udaipur prints Rs 21,51,258 across six terms — Term I Rs 3,29,955 after the Rs 1,00,000 acceptance adjustment with the Rs 20,000 refundable caution inside, then Rs 3,83,298, Rs 3,79,255, Rs 3,56,250, Rs 3,51,250 and Rs 3,51,250 — with hostel (Rs 25,000-26,250 a term) and mess (Rs 24,255-28,298) inside every term. Financial assistance sits at the Rs 6,00,000 household-income line, as tuition waivers sized to assessed need. The document was re-read today.

Sambalpur’s flagship MBA fee is not published anywhere. Its /admission/ page serves today — contact blocks and the policy PDFs — but no fee table, and the only signed institute fee on record is the MBA-BA Delhi programme’s Rs 17,25,000. We state that gap rather than quote an aggregator. Until the institute prints, treat any figure for the flagship as unverified, and expect the offer letter to carry the binding number.

The quota question, answered from print

Neither institute prints any management, institutional or discretionary route — no IIM does. Udaipur’s policy closes with the reservation table (SC 15%, ST 7.5%, OBC-NCL 27%, EWS 10%, DAP 5%) and a misrepresentation clause that ends candidatures; Sambalpur’s runs its three stages off the CAT alone. An agent quoting a priced seat at either campus is selling the thing those sentences name.

Who should pick which

• Pick Sambalpur if your percentile sits in the 85-93 band (85 if the concession covers you), your sectionals are uneven — there are no sectional gates — or your profile carries roughly 24-36 months of real work experience. Accept that the fee is unpublished and plan with the offer letter, not a rumour.
• Pick Udaipur if you clear 94 with 75 sectionals, want the printed Rs 21,51,258 residential certainty, and your strength is the CAT score itself — 55% of the final — rather than a long career. Watch your email after the result: registration is invitation-only, and missing the window ends the candidature.
• Either way — both are solo doors with email-driven calendars after the CAT result. The institutes’ own pages carry the operative dates; no third party does.