The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : Court order brings cheer to students

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Jul 05, 2005

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Court order brings cheer to students

V. Jayanth

They describe the "legal battle" over the entrance test as one between the Government and students Hundreds of students atThe HinduEducation PlusFair in Madurai expressed their unhappiness over changes in the admission policy

CHENNAI: Supreme Court order on CET has gone along expected lines. But the real suspense has just ended and the stage is set for the process of admissions to professional courses to resume. Students and parents have welcomed the apex court's unambiguous ruling and hope that the Anna University and the Directorate of Medical Education will speed up the counselling exercise.

From June 9 when the Government Order on the new admission policy was announced, it was clear that it violated existing rules and regulations formulated by the Medical and Dental councils and the All-India Council for Technical Education. And this is exactly what the First Bench of the Madras High Court said in its ruling. The State Government chose to appeal to the Supreme Court, even as the counsel for the students filed a caveat there.

One of the main reasons for the new policy was the purported bias against rural students who had no access to the coaching classes that abound in urban centres. But the hundreds of students who congregated at the Education Plus Fair organised by The Hindu in Madurai over the weekend were against the changes in the admission policy. There were students from Sivakasi, Karaikudi, Virudhunagar, Tirunelveli and a host of places around Madurai at the two-day fair that provided them a glimpse of the admission process and the options before them.

In one voice they described the "legal battle" over the entrance test as one between the Government and the students. Following a detailed presentation of the possible cut-off marks under the two admission modes — with the entrance test and with just the Plus Two marks — by education analyst Jayaprakash Gandhi, it became clear to many of them that more rural students may miss out if they were to be admitted only on the basis of Plus Two marks. They were told that the cut-off marks for engineering colleges could drop by four marks this year if it was on the combined strength of Plus Two marks and the Tamil Nadu Professional Courses Entrance Examinations (TNPCEE).

Similarly, anything below 198 in the Biology group could mean no seat in medicine, if was on the basis of just the Plus Two marks.

Two issues angered the students: i) the management quota seats, which were the "priced seats," that only the affluent could secure even with much lower marks, and ii) with the TNPCEE marks included, even those with up to, say, 270 out of 300 marks could get a seat in a "good college."

The Plus Two marks only option would close the doors on many of them, and they had not applied for a seat in the arts and science colleges hoping they would be able to get a seat in the Government quota.

Their other regret was that because of this confusion in the admission process, many of them were "forced" to book seats in the Deemed Universities or go for seats under the management quota in private self-financing colleges.

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