BENGALURU: The Joint Entrance Examination (JEEMain) for admission to top engineering institutes began on Tuesday amid stringent precautionary measures in view of the Covid-19 pandemic. The exams were earlier postponed twice due to the prevailing situation. The National Testing Agency, which conducts the examination, stepped up safety protocols, and even those checking the students were seen in PPE kits at a centre in Bengaluru. Masks were provided to the students at the exam centres. In all, 43,894 will write the examinations at 33 centres in Karnataka until September 6.
However, the number of students who wrote the examination will only be known cumulatively after the last paper is done, said a source from the HRD department. The low number of students on Tuesday was due to the papers — B.Arch. and B.Planning — which are attempted by architecture students. The major lot of students are scheduled to start arriving from Wednesday.
The examination which is held in two shifts – 9am to 12 noon and 3pm to 6pm — is a Computer-Based Test (CBT). Although the exam centres were increased from 570 to 660 throughout the country, students who attempted the examination on the first day were inconvenienced as the BE examination that they would attempt on day two was at another location. This comes in the middle of the pandemic, where students are trying to minimise their movement
‘No point writing the exam this late’
A student at a centre in KR Puram said that on day two, she has to go to a centre in Rajarajeshwari Nagar, which is on another side of the city altogether. One of the officials in charge of the examination confirmed to The New Indian Express that this was due to the fact that B Arch and BE papers are not held at the same centre. In the meanwhile, several students also opted out of the examination on Tuesday owing to different factors. “I have already taken admission in another college. They did not have an entrance examination and took students on the basis of the previous marks this time, and classes already started today,” said a student. “There is no point writing the exam this late and the academic year starting even later. I’m dropping a year,” said another.
883 STUDENTS ENROLLED UNDER RTE
Bengaluru: As many as 883 students were allotted seats in private aided and unaided schools under Right to Education in the second round of lottery held on Tuesday. A total of 5,118 eligible children were considered for the lottery in the second round, according to an official release. The government had received a total of 11,466 applications under the Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009. Of these, 11,026 applications were taken up during the first round of lottery on July 29 and 5,916 children were allotted schools. ENS