After much drama and suspense, Delhi University’s 63 colleges are ready to open their doors to about two lakh students on Monday. Of these, around 60,000 will be first-year undergraduate students.
This summer saw a spate of dramatic developments when the University Grants Commission sent an order directing the university to roll-back the four-year undergraduate programme and the university administration refused to give in. The Vice-Chancellor ‘pretended to resign’ and after the whole drama was played out on live television, the FYUP was finally rolled back. As a result, the second year students too will be newcomers’ of sorts this year as the FYUP structure in which they were admitted no longer exists.
Since the Academic Council and the Executive Council met only on Saturday and approved the courses to be taught, many teachers have still not got their time-tables. Confusion may prevail though as interviews for appointment of teachers will also be taking place on Monday.
Also, a pertinent question being asked is whether the Vice-Chancellor and his team will descend on the colleges for their traditional “surprise” visit where errant teachers and principals not taking classes are usually pulled up.
This June over the course of two weeks, more than two lakh students applied for the 54,000 available undergraduate seats at Delhi University. The admissions took place through cut-offs which the colleges had set. And this time almost all colleges have ended up admitting more than their sanctioned strength, taking the total number of new admissions to around 60,000.