DU cut-offs for science courses dip 1-3 %

The cut-offs for Science courses have dipped further in the 3rd list but the downslide this time is comparatively lesser than the 2nd list, reports Sidhartha Roy.

The cut-offs for Science courses have dipped further in the third list but the downslide this time is comparatively lesser than the second list. This time the cut-offs have mostly gone down by one to three per cent.

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The cut-offs for pure science subjects like Physics, Chemistry and Botany have gone down by one to three per cent at most places, including both popular colleges like Hans Raj, Sri Venkateswara and Kirori Mal and off-campus colleges like ANDC, Dayal Singh and Moti Lal Nehru.

However women colleges like Miranda House and Gargi, which had slightly lowered their cut-offs for science courses in the second list, have closed admissions for almost all subjects. The restructured B.Sc. General courses — B.Sc. Life Sciences and Physical Sciences — have taken a more severe beating than the basic courses.

Maitreyi College, which has closed admissions for most courses, has brought out the list for only these two courses and has lowered the cut-off by four per cent for both. “The B.Sc. general course used to be much more popular earlier but the restructured courses are not doing that well. It is perhaps because the syllabus has not been made that well and students do not prefer it,” said S.R. Arora, Principal of Hans Raj College.

It is another reason why Maths (Hons.) is very popular. Sri Venkateswara College Principal A.S. Reddy said students feel studying this course would make it easy for them to take up a MBA course later. Admission to another popular course, Computer Science Honours, has also been closed at many colleges or the cut-offs slightly lowered by other colleges.

“I had opted for Computer Science at most colleges as I wanted to do a professional course and a pure science one because that would not give me a job,” said Arjun Behl, who had queued up at a counter at Keshav Mahavidyalaya.

The reason most Delhi University colleges have to come out with a fourth or even fifth list for science courses is because they face a high dropout rate. As a result, all colleges usually fill up three times the number of seats they have.

The first preference of students is to go for engineering and medical courses and a seat in a DU college is just a back up for them.