Amid chaos around the admission process, junior colleges are chalking out measures to make up for lost teaching time. With publication of the third merit list deferred by six days, the admission process has now been delayed by at least two weeks. According to the new schedule released by the education department, the third round of admissions will get over by August 2 and the fourth round is scheduled between August 7 and 9.
“Students joining late will not even get a month before the first exam, which is usually held in the first week of September,” said Hemlata Bagla, the principal of K C College at Churchgate that started classes this week. The education department has allowed colleges to start classes as soon as 70 per cent of their seats are filled up. Some junior colleges, including Mithibai College in Vile Parle and Jai Hind in Churchgate, started classes after the second round of admissions last week.
For students who are yet to join, K C College has planned extra classes. “We are also considering postponing the exams by a week or so but we haven’t decided yet,” said Bagla. N M College in Vile Parle started classes on Wednesday. “We usually conduct the first unit test in the last week of August. But we might have to postpone that because at least a month’s teaching time is required. Once the entire admission process is over, we will take a call,” said Parag Ajgaonkar, the principal of N M College.
On Thursday, colleges re-surrendered their in-house quota seats for the Central Admission Process (CAP). “We had already surrendered our in-house quota seats but they were returned to us. Now, we have again surrendered those seats,” he said.
On Wednesday, the Nagpur bench of Bombay High Court allowed minority colleges to surrender their in-house quota seats to the CAP. However, this has also led to confusion in some colleges. An official from a junior college in Govandi said the college tried to surrender its in-house quota seats but received a message that all quota seats- minority, in-house and management- had been surrendered. “It was a technical glitch but we were left confused until the education department clarified,” said the official.
The education department will release the vacancy list on Friday and candidates will have to fill up their preferences again on Friday and Saturday. The third merit list is likely to be published on Tuesday.
News Source (Indian Express)