Single Entrance Exam for Engineering
Bihar School Examination Board chairman A.K.P. Yadav has opined that the proposed common entrance examination for Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) and other engineering colleges would not benefit rural students.
The Union HRD ministry had prepared a draft recommending a common entrance examination for IITs and other engineering colleges, comprising National Aptitude Test and the marks scored in Class XII examination.
Yadav said: “There should be a single examination at the all India-level and admission to all engineering colleges (private, government or government-aided) must be through this test only.” The all India-level two-hour-long test should have objective-type questions in physics, mathematics and chemistry and the weightage of this test in the final merit list would be 80 per cent and the remaining 20 per cent weightage would be given to the students’ performance in the Class XII examination.
Each subject should have five different types of objective questions — single choice, reasoning-based, multiple choice, matrix matching type and comprehensive-based. However, the Union HRD draft recommendation had earlier suggested that in the entrance process to IIT and engineering colleges, one-third (33 per cent) of marks would be taken from NAT, while two-thirds (66 per cent) marks scored in Class XII would get weightage.
Yadav also feels that the recommendation of the Acharya Committee report of the Union HRD to give 66 per cent weightage of marks scored in the Class XII examination for admission to IIT would adversely affect the interest of the students of Bihar Board in particular, and of other boards of northern states in general. Only CBSE students would be benefited by the recommendations as a large percentage of CBSE students score marks above 74 per cent in the Class XII examination.
Available figures show that barely 0.73 per cent students score more than 74 per cent marks in aggregate in the Bihar School Examination Board Class XII examination as against 34.68 per cent students in the CBSE Class XII examination. Yadav also added: “The all-India test should be held around the second week of February every year so that students can get a month for revising the subjective portion for their Class XII board exam that is normally held in second week of March.”
Apart from this, the official model answerscript for the objective-type questions must be provided by the examination conducting authority by the evening on the date of examination itself to reduce the marketing style of coaching centres. The school board chairman said IIT and other high-standard institution entrance examinations should not be diluted at any cost and based on the results of the all-India examination, only top 10 per cent performer in the test should be allowed to appear for IIT-JEE examination.
The second-level JEE examination should be held around the second week of May. The second test for JEE must include an extra paper for mental ability (verbal and non-verbal) apart from physics, chemistry and mathematics. The final merit lists for admission at each college must maintain reservation policy existing in that state.
The Telegraph
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