Delhi: First nursery admissions list out; second on February 3

Now, parents will have four to five days to accept the admission, followed by verification and payment of fees

The first list for admission to nursery in Delhi’s private unaided schools for the academic year 2025-26 was released on Friday. Lists for major schools have previously included at least 100 to 200 students in their first lists.

The admission process for nursery began on November 28, 2024. (HT Archive)

The admission process for nursery began on November 28, 2024. According to a notification by the Directorate of Education (DoE), released in November, the second list is expected to be out on February 3. The entire admission process will conclude by March 14.

Now, parents will have four to five days to accept the admission, followed by verification and payment of fees.

“It varies school to school but for us, parents will have four days to complete fee payment. After that, depending on the vacancy, we will start working on the second list. We have released a list of 114 students on Friday,” said Tania Joshi, principal of The Indian School in Sadiq Nagar, south Delhi.

Jyoti Arora , the principal of Mount Abu Public School in Rohini, northwest Delhi, said that depending on past trends, at least 20-25% of the students in the first list will not accept the admissions. “We have 100 students in the first list. We will of course see some rejections, as parents apply to multiple schools and sometimes they want to wait to get their first preference,” Arora added.

The admission, according to DoE, is based on a points system allocated through different criteria. For example, distance between the student’s house and school is a major point for most schools, followed by whether the candidate has any siblings in the same school or even if anyone in the family is an alumni.

Different schools have different criteria which had to be uploaded on the school website and DoE website before the start of the admission.

Sumit Vohra, founder of one of the nursery admission portals in Delhi, said, “Most schools have released their lists. Some schools have also released the pre-primary and class one lists. The only tip I always share with parents is that if you have not gotten into your first preference and you want to wait for the second list, you can. However, you should consider blocking a seat in the first list but check the fee refund policy.”

Vohra added that DoE guidelines say that the schools are supposed to return the fees if the parents apply for a refund within one month of the first list. “Some schools do have fee refund policies but some schools say that they do not. So parents should always check that,” he said.

Tanima Dutta, a resident of Vasant Kunj and parent of twin boys, both of whom will get admitted to nursery this year, said, “We had shortlisted near about 20 schools with the top three options being The Mother’s International School, DPS RK Puram and The Shri Ram School. It is a very tedious process especially for first time parents like us. However, they did not get into those schools. The schools that they got into and we are considering are Chinmaya Vidyalaya, Ramjas International, Birla Vidya Niketan and Bhatnagar International School. We will finalise one of these and also wait for the second list.”