IIT entrance exam to go completely online from next year
The IIT entrance exam will go completely online from next year, according to a member of the IIT Joint Admission Board. The JAB, which is the policy-making body on IIT admissions, took the decision at a meeting in Chennai.In a statement, Director, IIT-Madras, and Chairman JAB 2017, Prof Bhaskar Ramamurthi said, “It has been decided that the JEE (Advanced) will be conducted in online mode from 2018 onwards. Further information regarding the examination will be provided by the JAB in due course.”
The HRD Ministry had earlier introduced the option of taking the Joint Entrance Examination (JEE)- Mains online.
The JEE-Mains is the entrance examination for admission to engineering courses offered across the country and a qualifying exam for JEE-Advanced which is required for admission to the prestigious IITs and NITs.
“In order to make logistics and evaluations easier it was decided today that the JEE-Advanced should be made online,” a JAB member said. “The concept was being discussed for many years, but it was necessary to have adequate infrastructure to conduct the exam online,” the member added.
More than 13 lakh students took the JEE-Mains this year, with less than 10 per cent of them going online. Around 2.2 lakh students were eligible to write the JEE (Advanced).
For admission engineering in 23 Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs), students have to appear for the Joint Entrance Examination – Advanced (JEE – Advanced). It is the sole admission test for the IITs.
Earlier this year, the Ministry of Human Resource Development notified two major changes in the JEE pattern for 2017. Firstly, there shall be no weightage for the 12th class marks in calculating the ranks in the JEE (Main) examination. Secondly, for the candidates to qualify for the admission in the IITs/NITs/IIITs and such other CFTIs whose admissions are based on the JEE (Advanced)/JEE(Main) ranks, they should have secured at least 75% marks in the 12th class examination, or be in the top 20 percentile in the 12th class examination conducted by the respective Boards.
For SC/ST students the qualifying marks would be 65% in the 12th class examination.
(With inputs from PTI)