Admission to prominent city colleges may be off limits for students who scored below 90 per cent in Std XII. As the first merit list was declared on Tuesday for degree first year admissions, a huge rise was seen in the cut-offs of many city colleges.

The colleges, however, were expecting this hike, with much increase in Std XII results this year. While Commerce stream has seen 4-5 per cent increase in cut-offs in popular colleges, there was a 7-8 per cent rise in Arts stream.