Cutoffs dropped only marginally in the popular courses such as BCom, BMS and BAF but entry was open to all for the science courses, irrespective of their scores

MUMBAI: Popular degree colleges such as St Xavier’s College did not release a third list for their admission, and many others such as Podar College and KBP Hinduja College released a merit list to fill the last tiny batch of unfilled seats; most colleges may not have a fourth round.

Cutoffs dropped only marginally in the popular courses such as BCom, BMS and BAF but entry was open to all for the science courses, irrespective of their scores. Degree colleges which had felt that admissions were slowing down, saw the pace pick up.

“We are not witnessing any slowdown in admissions now. Our fourth list is out, but we have very few seats to fill and hence the decline in cutoffs is rather marginal,” said Podar College principal Shobhana Vasudevan.

A similar story played out at KBP Hinduja College: For bachelors in accounting and finance, the cutoffs fell by less than 1%.

When compared to last year’s third list for the same course, cutoffs this year are higher by 2%. “In our college, every course has a percentage rise of 3%-4%. We have seen a good receipt of applications for all courses. The last cutoff for the traditional BCom was 75%,” said principal Minu Madlani.

St Xavier’s College principal Rajendra Shinde said the campus was already full and a handful of seats in science remained to be filled, so there was no third list for the arts programme.

In most colleges that offer the pure sciences programmes, more students are admitted than capacity.

But this year, with poor response in the BSc programme, most colleges have not even been able to fill to the total capacity.

“It is very likely that after the engineering and medical admissions progress, those who have taken admission as a backup, especially those trailing in the rank lists, may also leave if they secure a seat in a professional course,” said a principal.

This year, junior colleges in the city reported poor science results in HSC. The Mumbai division recorded a sharp slide in the success rate of science students of 8.4% over the previous year as opposed to a drop of 5% in commerce.

Other leading colleges such as N M College and Mithibai College are awaiting results of the Common University Entrance Test (CUET), which are still to be declared. The colleges will be giving 50% weightage to HSC scores and CUET.

Courtesy: Times of India, HT