On March 21, the university grants commission (UGC) said that there will be weightage of class 12 board marks in admission to the undergraduate courses at central universities including Delhi University.
A Common Entrance Test for UG & PG, No More Class 12th Marks
For millions of college aspirants who want to enter into UG and PG programs, a common university entrance test (CUET) from the upcoming academic year shall be conducted by India’s education regulator.
Mamidala Jagadesh Kumar, Chairman, UGC said that there are universities and colleges like IITs wherein the admission is happening purely on the basis of entrance examinations. In response to a query during the interaction, he said “For example, at IIT admissions, we use JEE scores primarily because of the diversity of the boards, and different kinds of evaluation systems. The same is true for university admission also. That is the reason, why we are giving one standard, NCERT syllabus, so everybody can prepare from there, and have a common reference”.
A minimum eligibility on board marks, however, can be set by a college and university.
Not just the central universities and their affiliating colleges, but also by private universities, state backed universities and deemed universities may use this CUET if they wish to do so.
UGC chairman said that “We believe that as envisaged in the national education policy (NEP), the CUET will provide a common platform to get admission in all universities and colleges across the country. The CUET should provide equal opportunities to candidates.” He claimed that “This is basically to reduce the burden on the students and the universities and the colleges and in fact the entire education system”.
CUET shall be conducted in total 13 languages including Hindi, English, Tamil, Odiya, Assamese, Punjabi, Urdu etc.
As from now on students won’t have to write multiple entrance tests for admission in UG and PG programs and this shall eventually reduce the financial burden on parents and students. Kumar added that this is one of the most important reforms as part of the NEP 2020.
The CUET will be conducted for both UG and PG streams and the CUET for post-graduation level is not mandatory at least in 2022-23.
For central universities like Delhi University, Hyderabad University, Allahabad University, Benaras Hindu University, Aligarh Muslim University, and the Central University of Kerala among others, CUET is mandatory moving forward. Whereas the State-run universities, deemed universities and private varsities can use CUET as their selection test for admission at the UG level on a voluntary basis.
Schedule of CUET:
The National Testing Agency (NTA) shall conduct the CUET in the first week of July and it will be based on the NCERT syllabus for class 12.
The exams will happen in two shifts :
- Shift 1 : Compulsory language test & 2 domain subjects, General Test
- Shift 2 : Four domain subjects and one language from a total of 19 choices
UGC chairman said the CUET will not affect the prevalent reservation policy in universities or at minority central universities like Jamia and AMU.