IITs, Prakash Javadekar veto HRD ministry's proposal to scrap JEE-Advanced

The human resource development ministry’s proposal to scrap JEE-Advanced — the joint entrance examinations for Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) — for easing admissions has been vetoed by the IIT Council, and by HRD Minister Prakash Javadekar himself.

The minister is the chairman of the Council that includes other officials from his ministry as well as IIT directors and chairpersons.

Quoting the HRD Minister the Human Resource Development Ministry stated in a press release that the "Council did not consider any further changes in the JEE (Advanced) system".

Doing away with the test was one of the crucial issues on the agenda for the Council’s meeting in New Delhi on Monday. The immensely tough entrance has been a pain point as it has lead to vacant seats during the past few seasons.

Only 18,138 candidated cracked JEE-Advanced this year compared with 51,040 in 2017. Following a directive from the ministry, IIT Kanpur, the convening institute for JEE-Advanced this year, released an extended merit list, after which 13,850 more aspirants got a chance at the premier institutes.

While a section of the governing bodies of the IITs are of the opinion that the existing structure requires changes, no consensus could be reached on Monday. Bringing in any radical changes at once, the ministry believes, could create more trouble for aspirants.

"Not just the IITs; many members of the council did not want the reforms. Hence, the proposal has been put on hold," a director of one of the older IITs said on condition of anonymity. 

The government, apparently, intends to set up a committee to look into either easing up the tests with a view to reduce dependency on coaching centres or scrapping it. 

"Somebody from the ministry had proposed scrapping of JEE-Advanced and the Council took up the issue on Monday. However, the plan didn't get support from either the minister or the IITs," a director of another old IIT said, adding the IITs have decided to work on the format of JEE-Advanced to ease admissions. "The matter is confidential but something is being worked out around it," the director said.

The HRD Ministry in its release said, "There will be no revision in tuition fee being charged from the undergraduate students in IITs". The board of governors of individual IITs, though, have been empowered to decide the fee for international students, it said.

Among other issues on the agenda was the demand for fee relaxation to attract foreign students. "The ministry will come out with a policy next month that will help us attract more students from abroad," said another IIT director. At present, foreigners pay a fee of ~600,000 per year.

The ministry also wants the IITs to recruit more foreign faculty apart from enhancing research by aiming for citations in reputed global journals.

The ministry had also asked the Council to ensure adequate number of candidates from SC/ST and OBC sections get seats reserved for them. "In view of the proactive action taken, 11,961 seats have been filled this year compared with 10,876 last year," Javadekar had said earlier.