More than 400 final year students at Delhi University have failed in an inter-disciplinary subject, Sociology, this year.
The students, who have alleged an error in evaluation, staged a protest outside the Dean Students’ Welfare office on Monday afternoon and demanded that the results be declared again.
Sociology in Contemporary India is an inter-disciplinary subject for students pursuing Honours courses.
The students who have failed are from colleges like Shivaji College, Laxmibai College and Janki Devi College, among others. While 250 out of 260 students enrolled under various Honours subjects have failed at Shivaji College, 102 out of 120 students enrolled in Political Science (Hons.) at Laxmibai College have failed. At Janki Devi Memorial College, 38 students have failed while 25 students have failed at Keshav Mahavidyalaya.
Calling it ‘mass failure’, the students and parents are now demanding that the university come out with revised results.
Protesting outside the Dean’s office, a student said: “Such a large number of students have failed in Sociology. It can’t be just coincidence. There must be an error in calculation of marks. We want that DU direct colleges to come out with a revised result.”
Dean of Students’ Welfare J. M. Khurana said: “We have taken into account the request. The matter will be taken up with DU’s examination branch soon.”
The students, all of whom are final year students, have hit the panic button as the result can hamper their plans ahead.
Many of them who approached their college, were asked to apply for re-evaluation. “When we approached our college, the authorities asked us to file for re-evaluation, which would involve re-calculation. But this is not a calculation problem. Something is wrong with the way the papers have been checked otherwise so many students will not fail in the same subject,” said another student.
The university’s examination head has said the matter is being looked into and any error, if there is any, will be rectified.