College admissions in Chandigarh: Experts counter figures, say cut-offs high this year too

Akashdeep Virk

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Chandigarh, July 11

While the digits suggested a dip, experts claimed that the cut-offs this year are as high as last year, considering the classification of the New Education Policy (NEP 2020) for realising the provisional merit list for admissions to 11 local affliated colleges.

The Department of Higher Education (DHE) released the cut-offs for both centralised and non-centralised courses late on Thursday evening. An estimated 16,000 seats were allotted by the virtue of merit.

The first online counselling for seats under the UT pool would be held on July 12 (from 10 a.m. onwards); the counselling for seats outside UT would be held on July 13 (from 10 a.m. onwards).

The second online counselling session is set to be held on July 18 for the UT pool and on July 19 for the outside UT pool.

Speaking about the reason behind the dip in rankings, GGDSD College, Sector 32 Principal Dr. Ajay Sharma said, “Regarding admission cut-offs, there have been significant changes in evaluation criteria as per NEP 2020. Previously, four marks (each) were awarded to every commerce subject for admission to the BCom course, resulting in a total score of 16 marks for all four subjects. However, this weightage has now been reduced from four to two, decreasing the overall weightage for four commerce subjects from 16 to eight. Similar patterns were followed for other courses.”

While GGDSD College remained the first preference for the toppers among the private colleges, Sector 11 Postgraduate Government College remained the top choice among the government colleges.

“The highest marks were recorded at 116.40 per cent (outside the UT pool), while this year it has been 107.20 per cent. If you consider the NEP rules, the score is even higher than last year,” said a professor of SGGS College, Sector 26. He added, “For the UT Pool, last time it was recorded at 114.98 per cent, whereas the cut-off this year is 106.74 per cent.”