NEW DELHI: The National Testing Agency (NTA) will begin the Common University Entrance Test-Undergraduate (CUET-UG) on Monday, with 15,68,866 candidates registered for the exam to be held from May 11 to 31 in India and abroad. Nearly 43% of the registrations are from Delhi, Bihar and Uttar Pradesh.
The exam ran into controversy last week after hundreds of candidates protested against the remote locations of their allotted centres, prompting the NTA to reopen the city re-allotment process.
An official release issued on Sunday said, “It ranks among the largest computer-based examinations conducted globally. The number of `test instances’ to be held would be 67,56,321 across 12,906 distinct subject combinations.”
“It will be held in the form of 35 shifts spread over the 21-day examination window. It would be taken up at 14 international cities across 13 countries abroad,” the release added.
On the first day of the examination on Monday, a total of 1,24,020 candidates will appear across two shifts. The first shift will see 63,247 candidates appearing at 314 centres, while the second shift will be held at 281 centres.
Tests will be conducted for subjects including English, Accountancy/Book Keeping, Business Studies, Economics/Business Economics, History, Political Science, Chemistry, Geography/Geology, Computer Science and Informatics Practices, and Sociology.
CUET scores are accepted by more than 250 universities for admission to undergraduate programmes. Forty-nine central universities, including Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi University, Banaras Hindu University and Aligarh Muslim University, accept CUET scores for admissions.
In addition, 36 state universities, 129 private universities, government institutions and deemed-to-be universities also accept CUET scores.
The agency said 96.6% of candidates had been allotted one of their preferred cities, with 79% getting their first choice.