DU ready to consider combination of test, Class 12 marks for UG slots

NEW DELHI: With the central government likely to hold a common entrance test for admissions to undergraduate courses at all the central universities, starting this upcoming session, officials at Delhi University (DU) said they are ready to adopt it immediately in combination with the Class 12 score of aspirants.

The other two central universities in Delhi, the Jawaharlal Nehru University and Jamia Millia Islamia, are yet to take a call regarding any change in their admission process.

Last December, the Union ministry of education constituted a seven-member committee to recommend modalities for the Central University Common Entrance Test (CUCET) for admission to undergraduate courses across central universities in accordance with the National Education Policy (NEP), 2020. The same month, higher education secretary Amit Khare also said a common entrance test for admission to all central universities will be implemented in 2021.

DU vice-chancellor (acting) PC Joshi, who is also a member of the committee, said, “The modalities of CUCET will soon be finalised and it’s highly likely that it will be implemented from the upcoming academic session itself. DU is also ready to adopt it from this year onwards. We have already sent our proposal to the UGC (University Grants Commission) stating that we want a combination of CUCET and class 12 scores of students for admission to undergraduate courses,” he said.

Joshi said the CUCET will be conducted online and will have two components -- an aptitude test and a subject-specific test. “DU won’t have a major issue in implementing CUCET. The National Testing Agency (NTA), which will conduct the test, has already been holding entrance exams for some of the undergraduate courses in DU over the past few years. Besides, we are planning to combine the CUCET score with the class 12 marks of students because we cannot make the Boards (CBSE, state board etc) redundant. We are yet to decide the weightage of these two components,” he said.

DU currently follows the merit-based admission process for admission to all undergraduate programmes excluding nine courses for which NTA conducts entrance exams every year.

“We are waiting for a nod from the education ministry before making a formal announcement,” Joshi said.

In Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), officials said CUCET won’t make much of a difference since the university offers only 10 undergraduate courses in foreign languages. JNU registrar Pramod Kumar said, “The NTA is already conducting entrance exams for admission to these courses. So, it won’t be a major issue for JNU to adopt it. However, we are yet to finalise anything in this regard.”

Jamia Millia Islamia registrar Nazim Hussain Jafri said the university is working on the modalities. “It’s going to be mandatory for all central universities and we will also adopt it. But we are yet to finalise our proposal. It will only be sent to the ministry after consulting our academic and executive councils.