Youngest scholar to get admission if marks tied in JNU entrance

JawaharlalNehruUniversity (JNU) will enroll the youngest applicant should two or more students turn up with identical qualification marks for its MPhil and PhD programmes.

The city’s premier university uses this age formula in allotting hostels.For its doctorate programmes, students are required to write an entrance test and sit in an interview. Marks are given in both. JNU rector Chintamani Mahapatra said the younger candidate will be given admission if two or more applicants secure equal marks in the interview as well as entrance test.

The step was taken as new rules by the University Grants Commission, the higher education regulator in India, put a cap on the number of research students a teacher can guide. The JNU vice chancellor approved the regulations this May.

“It will be in extremely rare cases that we will have to use the age criterion. We had only one or two such cases in some centres. In most cases the final decision can be done based on the marks scored by candidates in the qualifying exam,” registrar Pramod Kumar said.

DU, the city’s largest institution, gives preference to the older candidate but it has yet to come across a dead heat, according to officials.

“In case of a tie, some departments look at postgraduate and bachelor-degree marks of the candidates. If that also match, they look at the students’ age and the older one is given admission,” DU admission committee chairman M K Pandit said.

“But that never happens. We haven’t had such a situation till now.” The JNU rule has triggered outrage. “In the past we gave admission to all candidates on the merit list even if someone scored identical marks,” he said.

Students said the rule lacks logic and criticised the drastic seat cut in research programmes.

“How can you deny admission to someone who has qualified all stages? The hostel rule is still acceptable because you can get seat in a few months. But you will have to wait another year to apply for an MPhil or PhD seat,” JNU students’ union president Mohit Pandey said.