100% Cut-Off at DU: How Exactly is Admission Criteria Determined?

With the 100% cut-offs being touched the very first time in 2011, the trend continued in 2020 after a brief gap.

In what has become a norm, with the 100% cut-offs being touched the very first time in 2011, the trend continued in 2020 after a gap of a few years.

(Image: Erum Gour/The Quint)

This week, the bridge between metaphor and reality was crossed – YET AGAIN. Students have always been asked for their 100 percent, and Delhi University, one of India's most sought-after universities for undergraduate courses, has literally asked for 100 percent marks in a variety of subjects... even in the year of a pandemic, when admissions have been delayed by over three months.

In what has become a norm, with the 100 percent cut-offs being touched the very first time in 2011, the trend continued in 2020 after a gap of a few years.

As the first cut-offs at DU were released, the Lady Shri Ram College set 100 percent cut-off for three of its undergraduate courses – namely Political Science, Economics and Psychology.

The question, though is, how is a 100 percent cut-off decided? And, what are the factors at play that determine what an ideal and fair cut-off should be for a subject?

Just like the price of a commodity is determined by the pull & push of supply, demand and a host market factors, what exactly are the invisible forces at play that go behind determining a cut-off.