Parents demand audit of FYJC admission process

In Mumbai, 27,000 students lack First Year Junior College seats despite 135,000 vacancies. Parents demand a third-party audit of the flawed admission process.

Mumbai: Even after six rounds of admissions to First Year Junior College (FYJC), around 27,000 students haven’t got a seat despite there being over 135,000 vacant seats in institutes located in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR). Parents and education activists are now demanding a third-party audit of this year’s online admission process for the 1,047 junior colleges in the region.

Parents demand audit of FYJC admission process

Despite an ongoing daily merit round for admissions till October 5, it is unlikely that all students will be placed, suggesting that more than 100,000 seats may go unfilled in MMR.

Vaishali Bafna, chairman of System Corrective Movement (SYSCOM), a Pune-based organisation working in the education sector, said that despite thousands of seats remaining vacant each year, the education department continues to approve new colleges and additional divisions in existing institutes. This year, the education department approved 24 new colleges in MMR and additional divisions that added 7,920 seats.

In the academic year 2023-24, as many as 242 junior colleges in Mumbai failed to secure any quota admissions, while 433 colleges could not cross the 50% mark. This year, due to various reasons, around 90,400 students got the highest seat allocations in the so-called special round 1, which was declared after three regular rounds.

“There is no need for new colleges and approvals for new divisions,” said Bafna. “Instead, the government must plan the current admission process by the rules. Since very long we have been demanding that after the completion of the zero round, all seats from various quotas should be released for the general admission process, which will help accommodate more students in colleges of their choice.”

A frustrated parent of a student said that despite her daughter scoring 89% in Class 12, she could not secure admission in her preferred college in the arts stream even after the second special round. “We finally got the college of our choice in special round 3. When we inquired about seat availability, we discovered that seats were indeed available. However, we still don’t understand why we couldn’t get admission in the earlier rounds,” the parent said.

Considering all these facts, Bafna sought a third-party audit of this year’s admission process. “In 2017, the state government agreed for a third-party audit in the court. But after 2018, this audit was never undertaken by the government,” she added.