NEW DELHI: At a time when students across the country are protesting online against holding examinations amid the Covid-19 pandemic, the Delhi University on Friday released the schedule of examinations for the entrance-based undergraduate, postgraduate, MPhil and PhD courses. The National Testing Agency (NTA) will conduct the Delhi University Entrance Test (DUET) from September 6 to September 11, in online mode at 24 centres across the country.
There are nine entrance-based UG courses including BA (Business Economics), Bachelor of Management Studies (BMS), BBA (Financial Investment Analysis), BTech (Information Technology and Mathematical Innovations), BA Hons. (Humanities and Social Sciences), Bachelor of Elementary Education, BSc Physical Education, and the Five Year Integrated Programme in Journalism.
“Students will get the admit card 15 days before the commencement of examinations. The centres will be completely sanitized and disinfected. All safety measures—social distancing, wearing of masks and others will be followed at the examination centres,” said a DU official.
However, many students opposed the decision. They said that the DU has already destroyed the career of thousands of students by conducting online exams and now it wants to conduct offline exams during the pandemic. With Covid cases rising rapidly across the country, a large number of students will be at risk, they said.
“The NTA has not suggested an alternative option for students who are suffering from the virus. It must also be highlighted that there are only limited centres for these examinations forcing many to travel to these centres from red and other high-risk zones. They must endure anxieties around their physical wellbeing while taking an already stressful examination,” said a student.
The exams will be held in Ahmedabad/Gandhinagar, Jaipur, Amritsar, Jammu, Bangalore, Kolkata, Bhopal, Mumbai/Navi Mumbai, Bhubaneswar, Nagpur, Chandigarh/Mohali, Patna, Chennai, Raipur, Dehradun, Ranchi, Delhi (NCR), Shimla, Guwahati, Srinagar, Hyderabad, Thiruvananthapuram, Imphal and Varanasi. Around nine lakh students are expected to appear for the exams. The NTA has also announced dates for other examinations such as NEET-JEE, ICAR and OPENMAT (MBA).