Why Delhi University Cut-Offs Are Rocketing, Yet Again!

The first cut-off for Economics, Political Science, and Psychology at Lady Shri Ram College has closed at 100%.

(Photo: Aroop Mishra/The Quint)

Video Editor: Ashutosh Bhardwaj

Camera: Anthony S Rozario

Colleges affiliated to the University of Delhi (DU) love to defy gravity, year after year. That much is common knowledge. But beyond comprehension lies the hair-splitting fact that the first cut-off at the Central University’s Lady Shri College for Women has been set at an all-time high of 100 percent for three subjects – Economics, Political Science and Psychology.

Not just LSR, at Hindu College, the cut-off for Political Science has closed at 99.50 percent. Same is the case at Shri Ram College of Commerce, with 99.50 percent cut-off for BCom (Hons), and at Miranda House, with 99 percent for English – and the list goes on.

Outrageous as a 100 percent cut-off may appear to the common man, this benchmark for admissions is dreadful, if not worse, for students who have scored between 90 to 95 percent in their school-leaving examinations.

Students, who first had to clear Board exams, had their hearts in their mouths before hitting the submit button on results day, and now, they have to go through yet another agni pariksha (trial by fire).

But Why are DU Cut-offs So High?

Huge Jump in Number of Applicants – This year alone, around 3,53,918 students have registered for undergraduate (UG) admissions in DU, which is almost a lakh more than the 2,58,000 who had applied to the varsity last year. But Why?

• The DU admissions portal was open for almost ten weeks, from 20 June to 31 August, in comparison to the usual four-week window. This allowed students from a range of boards to apply for admissions to the University.
• Since a lot of foreign universities have decided to conduct online classes this year, several Indian students have decided not to study abroad.
• Delay in conduct of JEE Main & NEET exams meant that a lot of students could have applied to DU as a backup.

More Applications Than Seats – As mentioned earlier, around 3,53,918 have registered for UG courses at DU this year. But, guess how many UG seats there are in DU? Just 70,000.

This simply means that around 2,83,918 students will not be able to make it to DU.

But the question is, even if the cut-off for a specific course starts at 99 percent, shouldn’t it close at say 80 percent?

Enter: The Big Board Scorers

In 2019, around 17,690 CBSE Class 12 students had scored above 95 percent. Shocking, right? If that wasn’t enough, this number soared to 38,686 in 2020 – that’s a jump of 118.7 percent in just a single year.

Similarly, the number of students scoring 90 percent and above has increased by 63,000 to 1,57,934. Since the University of Delhi is a Central Varsity and since a lot of top scorers were uncertain about JEE and NEET, many could have signed up for DU, sending the cut-off sky high.

Now, since Boards send high-scorers in such great numbers, colleges have little option but to declare a steep cut-off, at least in the first round. Why, you ask?

Because, colleges have limited sanctioned seats and will have to accommodate all students (should they show up) who make it to the cut-off, even if the number of such students exceeds the sanctioned strength.

Hence, in order to avoid overcrowding, cut-offs love to defy gravity at the University of Delhi.