India's CUET likely to be largest university entrance exam in the world

In 2019-20, as per UDISE data, 12.7 million students were enrolled in Class XII across the country

Last year, 10.78 million students had appeared for the world’s largest college entrance examination conducted by China, GaoKao. However, India may surpass the Chinese Gaokao this year as the National Testing Agency prepares to conduct the Common University Entrance Test (CUET) in 13 languages.

Although data on the number of students clearing the Class XII examination is not available for 2020-21, data from Unified District Information System for Education (UDISE) shows 12.7 million students enrolled in Class XII in 2019-20. If 90 per cent of students prepare to sit for CUET, India will have over 11 million appearing to secure a seat in the country’s 45 central universities.

The number is expected to be higher in 2021-22, given that enrollments in Class XII have been rising. In 2017-18, 12.2 million students were enrolled in Class XII. Compared to 2012-13, Class XII enrolments have increased 17.7 per cent. Of the 12.7 million registered in Class XII in 2019-20, 48.4 per cent were girls.

India currently conducts a central entrance examination for undergraduate medical and engineering courses. The Joint Entrance Examination for engineering and architecture, last year, had an enrolment for 1.1 million candidates, whereas 1.6 million had registered for the medical entrance test, National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET).

Until now, barring engineering, medicine and law, there was no set pattern for entrance in most undergraduate courses in the country. Some universities like Delhi University relied on Class XII marks, whereas others conducted entrance tests.

The government had introduced a Central Universities Common Entrance Test earlier but could only get a handful of universities to come on board. While 15 universities were conducting exams via CUCET in 2019, in 2020, this was reduced to 14. By 2021, only 12 universities were conducting exams via CUCET.

Meanwhile, over-reliance on Class XII scores had contributed to grade inflation and high cut-offs. An earlier analysis by Business Standard had found that the number of students scoring over 95 per cent had jumped seven times for Central Board of Secondary Education conducted examinations between 2010 and 2021. Nearly 1.4 million had registered to appear for CBSE exams last year. In 2010, only 1,202 students appearing for CBSE Class XII had secured over 95 per cent; in 2021, the number was 70,004. The number of students scoring over 90 per cent had jumped 58-times.

Although the exact number of seats available under the CUET is unknown, as per the All India Survey on Higher Education 2019-20 report, there were 540,270 students enrolled in central universities and another 736,623 enrolled in Central University’s affiliated and constituent colleges across the country.

The total number of students enrolled in undergraduate courses was over 30 million. State and private colleges can also use the CUET for admission.