DU admissions: Riot-hit Delhi students may face hurdles, say profs

NEW DELHI: Students hailing from northeast Delhi, where a communal violence in February this year forced postponement of board examinations, may be at a disadvantage in the Delhi University admission process, some professors have said. They have demanded a separate arrangement for them.

The professors expressed their apprehensions after the Central Board of Secondary Education, or CBSE, said that results of the students from the area "will be declared based on performances in the appeared subjects and performance in internal, practical or project assessment".

One of the professors said the CBSE decision will put them at a disadvantage as "students usually do not take internals seriously".

Four-point assessment scheme

According to a four-point assessment scheme announced by the CBSE, marks for the pending Class 10 and 12 exams, which have been cancelled in view of the COVID-19 pandemic will be awarded on basis of marks scored by a student in his or her best performing subjects.

Taking note of cancellation of a few exams in northeast Delhi in view of the communal violence in the area during the anti-Citizenship (Amendment) Act protests in February, the board has decided to take into account internal exams to assess performances. "There are very few students of class 12, mainly from Delhi, who have appeared in the examinations in only one or two subjects. Their results will be declared based on performances in the appeared subjects and performance in internal, practical or project assessment," CBSE Exam Controller Sanyam Bhardwaj said.

Pankaj Garg, a former member of Delhi University's Academic Council, said that according to the datesheet issued for northeast Delhi students by the CBSE for exams between July 1 and 15, the exams for all the science stream subjects were pending.

"The CBSE cancelled the exams but what about students from northeast Delhi, and specially those from the Science stream, whose exams were pending. From the datesheet that the CBSE had released, Physics, Chemistry, Biology, Mathematics, Computer Science and English exams were pending. They will be at a disadvantage since their marks will be calculated on the basis of internal assessment. Students usually do not take internals seriously," he said. He said the university will have to keep a separate window for those who will take the exams at a later date.

"From what the scenario looks like, the new session is unlikely to commence before October. The varsity might keep a window open for students who take the exams at a later stage and maybe say that those students whose marks meet the fifth cut-off will be eligible for admissions to the varsity," Pankaj Garg added.

Cut-offs unlikely to be affected

Executive Council member Rajesh Jha said that the cut-offs in the coveted colleges are unlikely to be affected, but added that students with certain kind of subject combinations or students who were relying on some subjects in the remaining exams to score well might suffer. "Changing the admission policy will not be the right thing to do at this time. But keeping a special window for students from northeast Delhi, who had to see exams being postponed first on account of the riots and then for coronavirus could be done. It was not their fault, so why should they suffer," he said.

Meanwhile, Hindu College principal Anju Srivastava said that the cut-offs will depend on the results that will be announced by the CBSE on July 15. "We keep the cut-offs because of the limited number of seats at our college. The second cut-off and the subsequent cut-offs will be decided on the basis of the admissions that happen after the first cut-off," she said.

Wait and watch

DU's Dean (Admissions) Shobha Bagai said the varsity will "wait and watch" the situation since there is time till July 15, when the Board will announce the results. "We will just wait and watch for a few days. The cut-offs will come into picture once the results are out. We will just have a look at it. For instance, the Computer Science paper was pending and the impact will be similar on all the students. We will like to wait and watch and then the committee will take a decision whether to go ahead with the same methodology or whether we need to make certain changes. Right now, it's too early to say anything. We do have a window,” said Bagai.

Every year, Delhi University receives the maximum number of applications from students of CBSE-affiliated schools. As many as 2,05,434 applicants for undergraduate courses were from CBSE schools, out of a total of 2,58,388 applicants last year.

This year, there was a delay in the commencement of the admission registration process due to the coronavirus pandemic. The process of registration commenced on June 20 and will go on till July 4. The varsity has still not announced the tentative dates for announcement of cut-off in wake of the pending CBSE results.

Till now, over 1.76 lakh students have registered on the admission portal, with over 68,000 of them making payments.

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