NEW DELHI: The Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) saw an eventful day on Thursday as students went on to protest the massive application fee hike for PhD programmes. The university also announced that admissions to PhD programmes will be conducted by the PhD (NTA) and a common entrance exam will be held to determine eligible candidates.
“Massive hike in application fees from Rs 1,005 to Rs 3,545 is surprising. The National Testing Agency (NTA) has also merged entrance exams for different subjects. Entrance exams of similar subjects are clashing.”
“For example, two different subjects public administration and political science have been jointly placed under a common entrance exam which will be conducted for both subjects. We demand the university administration relieve NTA from its admission duties and roll back the fee hike,” said Anagha, JNUSU Counsellor.
"This time the fee has been increased without proper consultation with relevant stakeholders and with complete disregard for students who are underprivileged. They tried to do it in 2019 but they were forced to roll back this time they have simply announced it online.” VC JNU Santishree Dhulipudi Pandit said, “The varsity has nothing to do with this. It is NTA’s decision for the Universities.”