Institute of Rural Management Anand

Course Name: BSA Programme: PGDM-RM41and FPM-RM19

Date: 19/09/2020 Term – I Roll No.______________________

Mid Term Examination (Open Book)

Duration of Exam: 2Hrs Weightage: 25 percent Total Marks: 40

Instructions:

1. There are six questions in this question paper. The specifics are mentioned, read
carefully, and answer accordingly.
2. During the exam, clarifications will not be addressed by any invigilator or course
instructor. Try and answer to the best of your knowledge.
3. If you want to write the answer sheet by hand, then handwritten pages should be
scanned and saved in PDF format.
4. Please do not attach the excel sheet sent to you. You need to show the results in your
answer sheet.
5. Final submission should be uploaded only in PDF format in LMS.

Answer the following questions.

Q-1. Sachin’s Best Innings?

A team of five eminent cricketers from the 20th century were entrusted with the task of
identifying the most influential ODI batsman of this generation for the Wisden Almanack. They
chose Sachin Tendulkar as their unanimous choice. Therefore, now they are required to identify
his five most influential innings. Disregarding the strength of the opposition or any other factor
apart from the venue of the match (home/away/neutral), the judges must identify the top five
centuries scored by Sachin. If the location of the match (home/away/neutral) is the only factor
responsible for the difficulty/ease of scoring a century, help the judges identify the top 5
centuries and the opponents against whom they were scored. The data on centuries scored by
Sachin is given in the excel sheet “Most Influential Innings”. (10 Marks)

Q-2. The Admission Chair’s Quandary

The Admissions Chair of Rural Management Institute is in a bit of a dilemma these days. The
Institute has an approved intake of 240 students for the current batch. However, he finds that

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285 students have qualified the cut-off norms and have paid the joining fees. Now the question
is how to accommodate so many students if they do turn up. There is tension in the air. The
Admissions Chair delves into past records and finds that around 17% of the selected candidates
who pay the registration fees do not eventually show up, i.e. they “drop out” and reclaim the
fees after forfeiting a nominal amount. If more than 240 students register for the course, then
there are problems in the form of capacity constraints (seating arrangements, hostel
accommodation, etc) apart from facing queries from the Regulatory Agency. What is the
probability that the Admissions Chair does not have to face this embarrassment? How would you,
as statistics students help him?

(Clearly state the assumptions, if any, you are making and the justification of using a approach).
(6 Marks)

Q-3. The Sad Case of Reena Jafri

Reena Jafri was a young woman who was a junior manager in a company. She got married to
Ashish Paul. After two happy years of marriage, they gave birth to a baby and named him Sunil.
All was well until one day Sunil, perfectly healthy until then died suddenly in Reena’s arms. There
was a brief inquiry into the death. As per the inquiry report, the cause of death was ascertained
to be Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS). The couple after a brief period of mourning decided
to move on. They got a second baby and named him Shashi. Again, after a brief period of joy,
Shashi too died in identical circumstances as Sunil. Now the police suspected foul play and
arrested both Reena and Ashish. There was a long trial. As part of the trial Arnab Lahiri, an expert
medical statistician was called for his opinion. Arnab had carried out extensive research on SIDS.
He said that the chances of an infant dying on account of SIDS in an “innocent household” was
one in eight thousand. Hence the chances of two infants dying from SIDS in an “innocent
household” was the square of the same, i.e. one in sixty-four million. In other words, he showed
in his presentation to the court

P (two infants dying in the same household/The household members are innocent) =
1/64000000

According to him, such an event was highly unlikely to happen, but it did happen! So, he said that
it was but obvious that the couple was guilty of killing their children and suggested the most
stringent punishment for them. The lawyer of Reena and Ashish was worried. He could not
understand these probabilities and wanted someone to help him. He realized that PRM 41 of
IRMA were a statistically adept lot and he approached them to help the couple.

Clearly suggest fallacies, if any, in the expert opinion and your counterargument to help the
couple using statistical thinking. (6 Marks)

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Q-4. You are a participant in “Khulja Sim Sim”, an Indianized version of the US gameshow “Let’s
Make a Deal”. However, as against the traditional three-door game, you are presented with five
doors (labelled A-B-C-D-E). Behind one of the five closed doors, there is a car and behind each of
the other four, a goat. The host of the game-show Mr. Natwarlal asks you to select a door. Mr.
Natwarlal knows behind which doors are the goats and behind which door is the car. Once you
select a door, he proceeds to open each of three other doors containing goats. Mr. Natwarlal
now gives you the option of switching your choice from your initial choice of door to the other
unopened door, or of sticking to your initial choice of door.

While your understanding of the three-door game tells you to switch your choice, does the same
logic apply to the five-door game? What is the probability that you will lose if you do not switch
your choice? What is the probability that you will win if you switch your choice? Clearly justify
your responses with appropriate reasoning. (6 Marks)

Q-5. State with reasons whether the following statements are true or false:

1. For a standard normal variable Z, the value of Z, say Z1, for which P(-Z1≤Z≤Z1) = 0.9 is 1.78.
(2 Marks)
2. The expected return from an investment is 10.5%. This means that over the next five years
we can expect to get an average return in the vicinity of 10.5%. (2 Marks)

Q-6. Revisiting Makrand Godbole Case

Recall the case of Makrand Godbole (Medical Representative) discussed in the class. A copy of
the case is given below for your recollection. You are required to do the following:

A. Clearly suggest how you would find the required probabilities. (3 Marks)
B. If you were Godbole what would be the decision taken by you and why? (2 Marks)
C. Assume an alternative scenario where Mr. Godbole had 28 days to complete his target of
which he reserves 1 day for going to Bangalore, however in this scenario assume that the
probability of lost day is 7 %. Given the above, what would be your suggestion to Mr.
Godbole? (3 Marks)

The Case of the Medical Representative

Mr. Makrand Godbole, sales representative of WKPIL (Well-known Pharmaceuticals India limited) is one
of the promising representatives located in Mumbai City He has won several awards for his excellent job
of meeting the targets. Last year, he has also won the National award of BEST REPRESENTATIVE of the

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year. One of the most important jobs of the medical representatives is to meet the practicing doctors and
introduce to them some of their new products and discuss with them about their advantages over the
other existing products. As the awareness of the doctors about the products of WKPIL has a direct relation
to the sales, the company fixes targets on the number of doctors to be visited over a period of time. WKPIL
has a policy of finalizing the annual as well as quarterly targets in consultation with the concerned officials.
The company believes that this is the best way of involving the entire organization in the decision making
process, and it is observed that the officials become more accountable and are generally bound by the
decision as they were part of the decision making process. To meet the current target, considering the
number of visits that can be made per day, Mr. Godbole needs to meet 100 more doctors in Mumbai in
the 27 days that is remaining in the quarter. The regional manager of Southern Region, Mr. Nagraj, has
extended an invitation to Mr. Godbole to address and interact with his fellow representatives, in the
current term, highlighting the factors that helped in his achievements. The company feels that this will be
a motivating factor for other representatives. The venue for this meeting is identified as Bangalore, which
is quite a distance from Mumbai. Even if he flies to Bangalore, Mr. Godbole needs a day exclusively for
this purpose. Mr. Godbole knows that he requires at least 25 days to complete his target. As such, it looks
it is possible to take a day off required to go to Bangalore. However, he is also aware that he cannot walk
on a tight rope like this because there are some of the days during which he cannot travel to meet the
doctors due to the following exhaustive reasons.

a) In Mumbai City, a disturbing trend lately is that some political or social organizations announce bandh
or hartal, as a mark of protest some policy of the Government or to highlight a specific problem facing the
society. During these days, there is a total restriction on movement of the public. And, therefore, during
the days when a bandh or hartal is declared, Mr. Godbole will not be able to meet the doctors.

b) And also, during the current season (viz. monsoon season), when it rains quite heavily, some parts of
the city get flooded with water. As a result of this, some of the roads get blocked, suburban rail services
are cancelled and, hence, on these days, again Mr. Godbole will not be able to meet the doctors.

Since Mr. Godbole is not willing to miss the target, he wants to make sure that he works for at least
25 days to meet the target. At the same time, he is very keen to go to Bangalore to address his fellow
workers in southern region, as this will be a professional boost to his career, and in the process, he may
help his fellow workers also to excel. To ensure that he gets enough working days, he wishes to find out
the frequency of the happenings of these two events. After scanning through the newspapers of the last
two years, Mr. Godbole observed that during the monsoon there is a one in 30 chance that, on any day in

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this season, the roads are blocked due to flood in the city. He also observed from the records of the civic
administration that the movement in the city was restricted due to bandh or hartal, etc. for 14 days in the
last 2 years viz., about 730 days.

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