CAT 2009 was supposed to be the eureka moment for those who believe future of education is online and its high time that we join the bandwagon. Instead it turns out that CAT 2009 was designed for those believe that offline is the best line. From claims that the servers were hit by viruses to the hapless students who were left in wilderness, everything about this years CAT was so goddamn weird. A press release on CAT 2009 website (edited version pasted here) best sums up the plight of test takers and of those who conducted it,

The first phase of computerized CAT 2009 concluded on December 8, 2009. Most candidates completed the test successfully in the first slot allotted to them; of the candidates who could not complete the test successfully in the first slot allotted to them, most have already been accommodated in another slot to take the test. However, there are still some candidates (numbering a few thousand) who could not take the test due to genuine reasons and test has not been rescheduled for them yet. A new test date will be announced in about a fortnight to provide an opportunity to ALL such candidates to write the test. 

Candidates have reported through various channels the nature of disruptions faced that include pressing of End button prematurely, malfunctioning of computer on which the test was taken by the candidate, missing graphs & charts, etc. We have put in place a process to identify and assess the impact of various types of disruptions noticed and reported during the entire testing period; these are being addressed to ensure fairness in testing.
We would also like to state that test papers have been designed by experts to ensure that no one gets an unfair advantage. Statistical methods are commonly used to equate difficulty levels across the test papers.
We would like to assure all concerned that the outcome of the process on completion would be fair to all candidates.

What I find most interesting in the press release is the use of word "Most". What are they thinking? Is this some kind of a joke? People take sabbaticals, put their life on hold for these exams and what we get is "Most candidates completed the test successfully". There are loads of suggestions coming in for CAT 2010 and how to conduct it successfully. But what to do with CAT 2009 ? Scrap it? May be that’s what they will decide at today’s IIM directors / MHRD meeting.