Key Takeaways

• Only 11.8% of Indian undergraduates are enrolled in Engineering & Technology (AISHE 2021-22), meaning roughly 9 in 10 students walking into a placement drive are non-tech.

  
  

• Non-tech streams trail on employability too: Arts (55.55%), Science (61%), and Commerce (62.81%) all score below Engineering (70.15%) and CS/IT (80%) per the India Skills Report 2026.

  
  

• Non-tech interviews fail more quietly than tech ones. There's no equivalent of "the code didn't compile", so a weak case structure or a skipped DCF assumption often goes unflagged and gets repeated in the next interview.

  
  

• Human coaching for non-tech domains costs ₹2,000 to ₹8,000 a session and needs advance booking, leaving most non-tech candidates with zero real practice before the interview that actually counts.

  
  

• Domain-calibrated AI mock interviews close that gap with unlimited, scored practice across six readiness dimensions, on-demand, at no per-session cost.

Introduction

Placement season runs on one assumption: that engineering seats are the hard ones to fill, and everything else fills itself. The enrolment numbers say otherwise. Government data shows engineering students are a minority on Indian campuses, which means the seats going in unprepared, year after year, are mostly the ones nobody built prep material for.

What Do the Enrolment Numbers Actually Say?

The Ministry of Education's All India Survey on Higher Education (AISHE) puts undergraduate enrolment at 34.2% in Arts, 14.8% in Science, 13.3% in Commerce, and just 11.8% in Engineering & Technology. 

Roughly 9 in 10 students walking into a placement drive did not study engineering. Yet nearly every "interview prep" resource (question banks, YouTube channels, coaching centres) is built around DSA rounds and system design. The other 9/10ths are left to prepare with whatever generic advice they can find.

Why Does Employability Drop Outside Engineering?

The gap isn't just about volume of prep material. It shows up in outcomes. The India Skills Report 2026 recorded employability at 80% for computer science/IT graduates and 70.15% for engineering overall, against 62.81% for commerce, 61% for science, and 55.55% for arts graduates. 

MBA employability actually fell, from 78% to 72.76%, in the same cycle. Non-tech and management streams aren't less capable. They're consistently scoring lower on the exact readiness metrics recruiters use to shortlist.

Why Do Non-Tech Interviews Fail Differently?

A tech interview has a visible failure point: the code either compiles or it doesn't. A finance, consulting, HR, or marketing interview fails more quietly: a case answer with no structure, a DCF walkthrough that skips an assumption, and a "tell me about yourself" that runs three minutes too long. 

Nobody flags it in the moment, so the candidate repeats the same gap in the next interview and the one after that. 

Our breakdown of reasons why talented candidates keep getting rejected in interviews covers this pattern in more detail. The issue is rarely ability. It's the absence of anyone pointing at the specific answer that lost the room.

How Can Students Close the Gap Before Placement Day?

None of this is a preparation problem tech students don't also face. It's a resource problem non-tech students face at a larger scale, because almost nothing in the market is calibrated to their domain. 

A human coach who understands both case interviews and BFSI-specific finance questions costs ₹2,000 to ₹8,000 a session and needs booking in advance. Most non-tech candidates get zero real practice rounds before the one that counts.

Pass98 was built around that specific gap: live AI mock interviews calibrated to six non-tech tracks, Finance & Banking, Consulting & Strategy, Marketing & Brand, Operations & SCM, and HR, each scored across six rubric dimensions with the specific follow-up a real panel would ask next. No booking, no ₹8,000 session, available at 2 a.m. before the actual interview if that's when the practice happens.

The 70% of placement seats that aren't engineering roles don't need less interview prep. They need prep that was actually built for them.

A candidate who's rehearsed the 50 most common interview questions across formats walks in with structure already built for the predictable half of the interview, leaving bandwidth for the follow-ups that actually decide the outcome.

FAQs

Which non-tech domains can students practise interviews for on Pass98? 

Six calibrated tracks: Finance & Banking (IB, equity research, CA/CFA), Consulting & Strategy (MBB, Big 4), Marketing & Brand (FMCG, D2C, digital), Operations & SCM, Human Resources (HRBP, L&D, talent), and Tech & Engineering, each with 200+ domain-specific questions rather than a generic question bank.

How many mock interviews should a student complete before the real one? 

A minimum of five sessions in the target domain, re-running the flagged weak dimension each time, is the readiness bar used internally. A single mock rarely produces a stable, repeatable score.

How is an AI mock interview different from practising with a friend or senior? 

A friend can tell you the answer felt weak but can't score you across structure, clarity, confidence, conciseness, and specificity, or generate the exact follow-up a recruiter would ask on your specific gap, which is what actually changes outcomes between attempts.

Is Pass98 available outside placement season for job switchers or working professionals? 

Yes. Working professionals preparing for a lateral move can select target-role difficulty directly, rather than practicing at their current seniority level, and run sessions around a work schedule since there's no booking requirement.

How much does Pass98 cost compared to a human interview coach?

Pass98 starts at ₹999, a fraction of a single ₹2,000 to ₹8,000 human coaching session, and covers unlimited mock interviews across every domain rather than charging per hour of a coach's time. 

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Written by Dipleena Saikia, a content writer with experience across tech, hiring, recruitment, and other domains. She researches and writes on emerging industry trends, helping readers stay ahead with clear, actionable insights.