Stalemate continues over Stephen’s admission plan

NEW DELHI: Days after St Stephen’s College announced its admission policy to give 15% weightage to interview marks for all categories of applicants, the college continues to be at variance with Delhi University’s policy that outlines separate merit lists for students in the open and reserved seats.

The university has communicated its decision to the college and its policy would prevail, university officials said. On Wednesday, the college said it will provide admissions based on 85% of the Common University Entrance Test (CUET) scores and 15% of the interview marks for all categories. As a minority institution, the college has the right to proceed with admissions as per its own admission policy. The varsity has announced that while minority institutes can reserve 50% seats for minority candidates as per past practice, admission to non-reserved 50% seats will be on the basis of CUET scores. For reserved seats, 85% of the marks for admission will be taken from CUET and remaining 15% can be allocated to interviews or any other mechanism as decided by the colleges.

Fifty percent of seats in various courses offered by minority colleges are reserved for students belonging to specific communities. St Stephen’s College and Jesus and Mary College are two of the Christian minority institutes under Delhi University. Sikh minority colleges under DU are Sri Guru Tegh Bahadur Khalsa College, Sri Guru Gobind Singh Khalsa College of Commerce, Sri Guru Nanak Dev Khalsa College, and Mata Sundri College for Women.

Under the current system, St Stephen’s issues its own cutoff lists, separate from the consolidated cutoff issued by the university during admissions. The college also conducts interviews as part of the admission process. The university was not meddling with the powers enshrined with the college as a minority institute, said registrar Vikas Gupta. “The college cannot discriminate against candidates and deny the chance to a candidate with higher CUET marks on the basis of the interview in non-reserved categories,” Gupta said.

The 50% open seats have to be filled purely on the basis of CUET merit to avoid any discrimination... VIKAS GUPTA, DU registrar