HSC results: Students fear higher cut-offs at colleges in Mumbai

With city colleges reporting a marked increase in the number of students scoring above 90%, the results yesterday brought smiles on students' faces, but also triggered fears of tougher admissions

The announcement of the HSC 2015 results yesterday brought a smile to many faces. The overall pass percentage of the state gone up by nearly 4 percentage points, and the city’s colleges have reported a marked increase in the number of students scoring over 90%.

Once the initial euphoria wore off, however, students began to fear a rise in senior college cut-offs due to the large number of high-scorers. While the pass percentage of the Konkan division went up from 92.6 in 2014 to 94.2 this year, that of Nagpur rose from 80.7 to 88.36. Mumbai’s pass percentage also went up from 81.1 last year to 86 this time around.

The increase in these and the other six divisions pushed up the overall pass percentage of the state to 87.9 from 84 last year. City colleges said there has been a stark hike in the number of students scoring over 90% this year. At H R College in Churchgate, for instance, the number has more than doubled from 91 students last year to 189 this year.

Principals say that while cut-offs may not rise significantly, it will be tougher to get a seat in sought-after colleges, given that a higher number of high-scorers will be vying for each seat. “This year, HSC students will finally be on par with their counterparts from other boards like CBSE and ISC, because they have also scored as well.

Until last year, we had to wait till the second or third list for state board students’ names to start appearing, but this year it looks like they’ll make their mark in the first list itself,” said Indu Shahani, principal of H R College. She added that while there has been a rise in the total number of 90% scorers this year, it may not affect cut-offs. “The number of high scorers has increased, the score hasn’t. So I feel the cut-offs will be similar to last year,” she added.

Seat struggle
Like every year, the biggest fear for students wanting to change colleges will be the few seats available in the open merit category. In case of courses like BCom, BSc and BA, colleges give first preference to in-house students. The remaining seats are then divided between minority quota, reserved categories (sports, arts & culture, management, etc) and very few are left for the open category.

Similarly, for unaided courses like Bachelor of Mass Media (BMM), Bachelor of Management Studies (BMS), Bachelor in Banking and Insurance (BBI), etc, some of the top colleges keep aside 50% of the seats for minority quota and another 20-25% for other quotas, leaving very few seats for the open category. “There are enough seats available, but the problem is that students tend to rush for seats in only a handful of colleges; this is what poses a big problem.

With more and more students passing with higher grades, merit lists might disappoint many and the blanket ban on increasing the number of seats or divisions in colleges acts as a big spoiler,” said Manju Nichani, principal of K C College. She added that there may only be a slight difference in cut-offs this year. Colleges have already started distributing admission forms (available in colleges between May 27 and June 10). The first merit list will be announced on June 16 at 6 pm.

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