DU admissions set to go fully online, but can servers cope?

THE DU WEBSITE HAD CRASHED DURING LAST YEAR’S ADMISSIONS WHEN BOTH ONLINE AND PAPER APPLICATIONS WERE ACCEPTED

NEW DELHI: The process of admission to Delhi University’s undergraduate courses will go completely online from the upcoming session and no paper applications will be accepted.

The decision — taken by the university’s admissions committee on Friday — is bound to raise concerns as the DU website had crashed due to huge traffic during admissions last year when both online and offline applications were accepted.

The decision is yet to be approved by vice-chancellor Dinesh Singh who formed the 23-member admissions committee. “In all likelihood, he will accept the recommendations of the committee,” said professor Nachiketa Singh, a committee member.

Till now admissions to only post-graduate courses were completely online while both online and offline forms were accepted for under-graduate courses. An earlier attempt at making the entire process online was opposed by the Delhi University Students’ Union (DUSU).

Though DU started online admissions in 2012, students largely choose to submit their applications offline. Last year, the university sold over 2.7 lakh forms offline while around 1.7 lakh forms were sold online.

Concerns of students from rural areas with limited or no access to internet facilities were also reportedly discussed at the committee meeting.

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