Panel in place, IIT test change on cards

The IIT may soon bring changes in their entrance examinations — the JEE for undergraduates and GATE for postgraduates.

The Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT) may soon bring changes in their entrance examinations — the Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) for undergraduates and Graduate Aptitude Test in Engineering (GATE) for postgraduates.

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A panel was set up under IIT Kharagpur director Damodar Acharya on Thursday to study the existing JEE structure and suggest improvements in it.

Currently, the IITs are taking students on the basis of cut-off prepared in view of the marks scored by students in the IIT JEE. Changes may take into account the Class XII marks of students to ensure that meritorious students get in.

The IIT directors also expressed displeasure at the existing GATE pattern and felt that not enough students with research orientation were being picked up through this exam.

The IIT directors were meeting HRD Minister Kapil Sibal at a brainstorming session in Manesar on Thursday.

Sibal said that each IIT should decide on one area of expertise for higher research and submit a proposal in a month.

The meeting, however, did not take any decision on the proposal to increase the tuition fee of students to make the institutes self-sufficient.

“The minister suggested that as the government was planning to set up a Higher Education Funding Corporation, which would provide assistance to poor students, the proposal on fee hike should be discussed after the corporation was set up,” said a senior official.

According to sources, the IITs were proposing an eight-fold increase in student fees from Rs 50,000 to Rs 4 lakh a year. They proposed the fee hike be spread over 10 years with a Rs 35,000 mark-up every year, thus helping the IITs become self-financing institutions.

“The IITs have also been asked to give a road map for compensation that will attract the best faculty from India and abroad...,” said the official.