Calcutta University has released a statement on Wednesday stating that candidates applying for decentralised counselling for BTech seats have to be domiciled in Bengal.
CU introduced the condition after announcing counselling for 89 BTech seats out of the 237 seats are still vacant after concluding centralised counselling by the JEE board.
According to the statement signed by Amit Roy, the secretary of the faculty council of engineering and technology, “Participating candidates must be the domicile of West Bengal. Domicile of other states shall not be eligible.”
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Although, a CU official informed that the university had not put any such condition in the centralised counselling. However, from the time Jadavpur University had added the domicile clause last year for admission to BTech courses, CU had been pressurized by a section of teachers and students to take a similar step.
Meanwhile, the online applications for admission commenced from December 16, 2020, to December 21, 2020. Students whose names are on the state JEE merit list will be admitted based on the merit.
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A member of the CU’s faculty council for engineering and technology faculty revealed that the eligibility criteria required for domicile quota seats would be the same as what was mentioned in the JEE 2019 information bulletin.
The rules read, “Only those candidates will be treated as a domicile of West Bengal who is either, a) residing in West Bengal continuously for at least for 10 (ten) years as on 31.12.2018; b) whose parent (s)is/ are a permanent resident(s) of West Bengal having permanent addresses within the State of West Bengal.’’
An official mentioned, “The rationale for the reservation is that students from Bengal were being outnumbered by candidates from other states in engineering courses. The same rationale was cited while introducing the quota in JU last year.”
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While asking about why the university did not add the domicile clause when the JEE board had started centralised counselling in August, the official mentioned that another section of teachers was against the domicile quota that an established university should not be closing its doors on more deserving candidates under the name of reservation.
“A domicile quota in my opinion will erode the institute’s regional diversity, which is an extension of a university’s inclusiveness,” stated a teacher of computer science and engineering.
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Additionally, the sources informed that the higher education department needed to know from CU in August whether the university had added the domicile quota at the time of centralised counselling.
Another teacher disclosed, “The university could not resist the pressure anymore and settled for the domicile quota months before the Assembly elections. The department had overruled legal constraints cited by the JEE board in implementing the domicile policy for engineering courses at Jadavpur University from 2019.”
As per the sources on the campus, the dean of engineering, and technology faculty council would hold a meeting on December 22, 2020, with the heads of the departments to discuss how to introduce the domicile quota during the centralised counselling in 2021.
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