Govt may soften stand, asks IIT-D to call meeting

IIT-Delhi will conduct senate meeting to discuss admission exam, among other issues, on June 21.

In what can be described as a ‘softening’ of stance, the government has asked the IIT-Delhi director to convene a meeting of the Joint Admission Board (JAB) to deliberate on the modalities and format of the JEE (advanced) exam.

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Besides this, there were indications that the JEE (advanced) test could be held on a separate day, and adopt a subjective format — in accordance with the demands of the IITs. It was also speculated that only IITs would be granted the responsibility of conducting the JEE (advanced) test, meant for the top 50,000 students screened from the JEE (main) examination.

According to sources, the manner in which the board marks would be used to decide on merit may also be ‘reconsidered’. Board marks, on the other hand, could be used just as a “filtering” measure — as is the current norm.

The speculations, however, can be confirmed only after the JAB meeting later this month. If this happens, the government would have fulfilled most of the major demands of the IITs.

The premier institutions had been demanding that board marks should not be included in the selection process, and the JEE (advanced) test should be subjective — to be conducted by the IITs themselves.

IIT-Delhi will conduct a senate meeting — with the JEE issue figuring in its list of agendas — on June 21. “The senate meeting will discuss issues related to undergraduate admission to IIT on June 21,” confirmed Dr Sanjeev Sanghi, president of the IIT-Delhi Faculty Forum.

A special senate meeting of IIT-Kanpur was convened for the purpose on May 8, during which it passed a resolution to conduct a separate exam in 2013.

IIT-Delhi Alumni Association president Somnath Bharti maintained that the general feeling among the IIT senates was that the exam should not be held in 2013. “They also hold that the IITs should have complete control (not only academic) over the JEE (advanced) exam, and there should be proper debate — based upon data obtained from school boards — on the feasibility of giving weightage to school board marks in the JEE (mains),” he said.

Human resource development minister Kapil Sibal is keen on introducing the new examination pattern from next year.