Special admission drive to encourage EWS, ST quota applicants

Of the 2.7 lakh candidates registered through the online admission portal of the varsity by Sunday evening, only 3,756 applied under the EWS quota.

With only five days left for the registration process for undergraduate admissions in Delhi University (DU), the number of applications received for the newly-introduced economically weaker section (EWS) quota are “abysmally low”, officials said Sunday. The university said it will launch a special drive to attract more EWS candidates.

DU had facilitated a 10% increase in seats this year to accommodate EWS candidates in the general category.(HTPhoto)

Of the 2.7 lakh candidates registered through the online admission portal of the varsity by Sunday evening, only 3,756 applied under the EWS quota.

A member of DU’s admission committee said there could be several reasons behind this. “Either there is lack of information or aspirants are struggling to arrange requisite documents or certificates. The university has also written to the department of higher education in the Union ministry of human resource development to intervene,” said the member, not authorised to speak to the media.

“With the introduction of the EWS quota this year, around 6,000 seats have been added to the existing 56,000. We need at least 12,000 applications to fill these seats. If the number of applications remains the same till the last day of registration, we will launch a special drive and re-open registration for the quota,” the member added.

In January, the Central government had cleared a 10% quota in government jobs and higher education institutes for those belonging to the EWS category. Following this, DU had facilitated a 10% increase in seats this year to accommodate EWS candidates in the general category.

Similarly, the number of applications under the Schedule Tribe (ST) category is also low this year. Only 4,756 candidates had applied in the category till Sunday evening. During an open day session at the varsity’s north campus last week, DU admission committee chairperson Rajeev Gupta said the university will launch a special drive to fill ST seats as well.

Hanraj Suman, chairperson of DU’s SC/ST/OBC committee for teachers, said, “A large number of ST seats had gone vacant
last year in colleges across
DU and the administration had cited lack of applications as the reason.

However, there is a requirement of special drives for these students. Also, DU should issue guidelines to colleges to lower cut-offs by up to 35% to fill ST seats. The seats cannot go vacant,” he said.