DU admissions: First seat allocation list out on Wednesday, questions remain

The list was earlier scheduled to be released on Tuesday, but late on Monday night, DU vice-chancellor Yogesh Singh confirmed to HT that the release of the list had been postponed to Wednesday.

The Delhi University is set to release on Wednesday its first Common Seat Allocation System (CSAS) list -- a crucial announcement that will effectively replace the cutoff system that existed in the past -- as part of its admission procedure for undergraduate programmes for the 2022-23 academic session.

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The list was earlier scheduled to be released on Tuesday, but late on Monday night, DU vice-chancellor Yogesh Singh confirmed to HT that the release of the list had been postponed to Wednesday.

Dean of admissions Haneet Gandhi said students will be able to view their allocated seats, if they qualify, on their Common University Entrance Test (CUET) dashboard. “They will be able to see the course and college that they have been allocated. Their highest possible preference will be allocated. The course and college allocation will depend on CUET rank, availability of seats, the category they belong to, and their preference,” she said.

Students, however, are still unsure about the way forward, and have pointed to the uncertainty that comes with being the first batch under a new admissions policy -- till last year, the university took students based on the marks they scored in the Class 12 board examination. In some years, the cutoffs in different courses skyrocketed to 100% -- at least eight colleges declared 100% cutoffs in 11 courses, including political science, computer science, and commerce, last year.

“There’s a lot of uncertainty. I don’t know if the CUET rank I’ve got is good or bad. For instance, in Indraprastha University, we know a reference range of ranks and can guess which college we can get into but in DU, this is the first time that the CSAS is being used and we are all clueless,” said an aspirant who asked not to be named. “As of now, it’s all guess work. We’ll have to wait for the first list for some more clarity.”

DU officials explained that once a seat has been allocated, the candidate has till 5pm on October 22 to accept the provisional seat. In case a candidate is offered multiple seats, they must accept only one allocated seat.

Once the candidate accepts the seat, the concerned college will check the student’s eligibility and documents uploaded. The verification will include the minimum eligibility of the candidate, programme-specific eligibility, and the validity and authenticity of documents and certificates submitted. During the online approval process, if a college seeks more clarity from the candidate, it may raise a query with the candidate.

After verification, the college will approve or reject the candidate by October 22, and in case of approval, the candidate has till October 24 to pay the admission fees.

The officials said that inactivity will be taken as non-acceptance of the allocated seat, and the candidate will no longer be able to participate in subsequent rounds of seat allocation.

In case a college rejects a candidate, it will provide a reason for doing so.

After the first round of seat allocations is complete, the university will display the number of vacant seats per college, if any, on October 25, officials said. Subsequently, DU will release a second allocation list on October 30, and a third list on November 10.

On Friday, DU released a simulated list of ranks for candidates who sat for the CUET to help students determine the probability of securing a seat at an undergraduate programme and college of their choice. After the list was released, DU aspirants, on their respective dashboards, could see the courses they opted for against their ranks in the respective courses.

The university said the simulated ranks were tentative, and were determined on the basis of CUET scores and course preferences submitted by the candidates.

For example, student X, a general category candidate, gave a preference for B.Com (H) and wishes to take admission at SRCC. X ranked 300 in the simulated list, but SRCC offers only 253 B.Com (H) seats in the general category. Thus, X would have to smartly analyse the probability that they can get admission at SRCC by checking the number of people who have preferred B.Com (H),

Gandhi had said at the time: “DU has been very transparent with students. They are now aware of their ranks in the courses they wish to pursue. They are also aware of number of students who have preferred the course that they have also preferred, along with the total number of seats available in a particular course and the number of seats available for a preferred course at their preferred college. Therefore, keeping all considerations in mind, students can change their preference if they wish to.”

However, she also cautioned that the ranking of a student on the simulated list could change depending on the final outcome of the list locked on October 16.

The university on Friday also also shared data showing that out of the 217,653 candidates who registered for admission to DU, only 175,149 have paid the registration fees, which means that only these candidates will be considered for admission.

There are 70,000 seats on offer across 79 undergraduate programmes and 67 colleges, departments, and centres.