CUET: Saviour for some, disappointment for DU aspirants missing out on college of choice

NEW DELHI: The Delhi University's maiden list for undergraduate admission on Wednesday brought cheer to those who could secure a seat in their first preferred college and course after the long wait. The Common University Entrance Test (CUET) has especially come as a boon to those who did not score well in their Board examinations.

Sudhanshu Maddheshiya, who was hoping that CUET will be his "saviour", got a seat in Rajdhani College in his choice of course. "I am from UP Board and did not score well in 12th class. If admission would have been conducted with Class 12th marks, it would have been difficult to secure admission in DU but CUET allowed me to prove myself," he said.

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Anjali Bhardwaj, the mother of a DU aspirant, was delighted that her daughter, who had chosen Lady Sriram College (LSR) as her first preference, got the seat. "My daughter had chosen LSR as her first preference for studying BA(Honours) Political Science and she has secured a place there. It was her dream to study Political Science in LSR and that has come true," she said. " There was uncertainty over CUET and the admission process but now that has ended. My daughter had taken admission elsewhere but now she will join DU," she said.

While there are around 70,000 seats, more than 1.5 lakh applicants have marked their college and course preferences till the last date for phase II last week. However, the university did not say how many students have been allotted courses and colleges. The allocation list has not been issued in the public domain and the candidate will only be able to see the college and courses allotted to them on their dashboard. The result of CUET, which has been conducted for the first time, also left many students disappointed as either they couldn't get into the desired college or have not made it to the first list of seat allocations for undergraduate programmes released on Wednesday.

DU UG Admission 2022

The students have been given a three-day window from October 19 to October 21 to "accept" the allocated seat. The provision for acceptance of a particular Allocated Seat will be valid only for the round in which the seat was allocated to the candidate. The colleges will be able to verify and approve the online applications from October 19 to October 22. For the first round of CSAS allocation and admission, the last date for online payment of admission fees by the candidates will be October 24.

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In the context of provisional seat allocation, 'Allocated Seat' refers to a unique combination of Programme plus College. However, the students who did not get any seats were in a fix whether they would be able to secure a seat in coming rounds. "I had chosen BA(honours) Economics as my first choice and SRCC, Hindu and St Stephen's as my top three preferences. But my name has not appeared on the first list. I am waiting for the second list now. ''I am worried whether I will get through or not. Already, CUET had left us in the lurch and now we await clarity," said Vipul Mishra, whose name did not appear in the first list.

Shakti, who got a seat in Ramjas College BA Economic, believes that she could have got admission in her dream college SRCC if there was no CUET and only Board marks were considered, as before. "I scored 97.1 in Class 12th. I could have scored much higher if there was no CUET. I had to focus on CUET as well. If the admissions were still through class 12th marks, I would have already gotten a seat in SRCC," she said. The university began the admission process last month for 79 UG programmes across 67 colleges, departments, and centers. The programmes include 206 combinations of BA program courses.