Aspirants urge University of Hyderabad to reopen admissions to master’s seats

Aspirants say they are being denied seats since UoH closed admissions before many universities, as a result of which master’s seats have been left vacant.
Students, exams rep image
Students, exams rep image
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Aspirants on the waitlist of University of Hyderabad (UoH) have urged the university to consider the candidates from the waitlist to fill up vacant seats in the master’s course. Deshdeep Dhankhar, an aspirant for the MA, Political Science seat, said that he was denied admission after securing the 36th rank. He claimed that this was despite students on the list withdrawing their admission to the university and migrating to other universities.

“The University of Hyderabad has closed admissions before many universities. As a result, many seats are left vacant in multiple departments of MA, MPhil & PhD, due to which student aspirants are denied admission,” Deshdeep said.

The students’ union of the university too highlighted concerns raised by aspirants like Deshdeep. “This year our university has closed master’s admissions before other universities declared results. As a consequence, the vacancy formed from students dropping out remain vacant and a huge number of aspirants stand outside as the university decided to close admissions,” the UoH Students’ Union wrote in a letter to the Vice Chancellor of the university on December 5.

“This is an unusual period with a health emergency. This is nothing less than denying admissions to hundreds of students and also leads to unfulfilment of reservation policy,” the letter added.

Abhishek Nandan, president of the UoH Students’ Union, noted that while UoH closed its admissions on November 19, other universities in New Delhi declared their results at a later date. He said that many other students like Deshdeep had approached the union with similar concerns.

“We know things have been uncertain for the student community during the pandemic and students went through a lot of difficulties during this period. Appearing in entrance exams was not easy for many students,” Deshdeep added.

When asked about the admission process and the possibility of seats going vacant, a UoH official told TNM that the admissions were closed on November 19 according to University Grants Commission (UGC) guidelines.

“Our academic calendar has exams in February and we have begun online classes to follow our calendar. We aim to bring the students back to the normal schedule by the third semester next year. We cannot comment on other universities, but we are simply going by UGC guidelines and commenced classes in November,” the official said.

The official added that more than 90% of the seats in the university were filled and that there were two rounds of admissions done before it was closed on November 19. The official cited time constraints for not reopening the admission process for seats that may go vacant.

Earlier in October, the Students’ Union had launched a relay hunger strike alleging subversion of the reservation policy in the MPhil and PhD admission procedure in the university.

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