This has reference to the item titled One lakh for admission? Beware of the DU fixer carried by the Delhi Times on June 5, 2009. I thank your paper for its vigilance against likely malpractices in admissions. 

We need to save young men and women from the wolves that prowl in the jungle of admission anxiety. I share this concern keenly. Corruption and academic excellence cannot co-exist. We have a duty to do everything possible to wipe clean the spreading smear from the face of higher education. Corrupt admission, if any, blights the culture of an institution. It undermines discipline, vitiates student-teacher relationship, and infects the institution with negativity, choking the spirit of sober academic pursuits. 

For the sake of your readers, and all else besides, I wish to clarify that there is no ‘VIP quota or ‘neta seats’ in St Stephen’s College. There is no ‘management quota’ either. The admission procedure is wholly transparent and there is no shroud of secrecy about it. Admission Guidelines evolved by the Supreme Court are spelt out clearly and the relevant information is in the public domain. Any deviation from the same is open to ready verification. We run an efficient counselling service by a team comprising teachers and students and they are accessible in the Staff Room on all weekdays. The Tutor for Admissions, besides, is available 24x7 on College campus. I am concerned that misgivings about the integrity of even institutions of proven uprightness like St Stephen’s could aggravate cynicism, especially among the youth, about all systems and institutions in this country. This hardly helps; and it needs to be averted. Commitment to excellence is one of the three pillars on which the founders of St Stephen’s established the college. It shall never be compromised. 

I urge all prospective applicants to St Stephen’s College to be vigilant against conmen who are adept at exploiting their vulnerability during the cruel admission season and to notify either the Tutor for Admissions or me of such instances at once. The college contact numbers are well-known. In addition, a complaint box is being placed outside room A in the college for this purpose. Let it be noted that the eagerness to ‘buy seats’ from the merchants of false hopes coupled with a disinclination to expose them, and the pretension to be able to sell them under patronage from ‘netas’, are two sides of the same coin! 

For the sake of the public, let me clarify that no applicant below the cut-off marks – which will be decided only after all applications are processed – in any course will be called for interview. The ratio between seats and interviewees is 1:4 in the Humanities and 1:6 in the Sciences. The cut-offs will be decided accordingly and the candidates shortlisted for interview in order of merit. 

Let me close by citing a relevant episode. Years ago, when I was on the Executive Council of Christian Medical College, Vellore, an alarming rumour spread that MBBS seats were being sold (presumably by the college authorities) for a hefty consideration. Upon enquiry, it was found out that a conman was operating an honest pay-back scheme. In CMC Vellore, candidates for interview are called in the ratio 1:3. So, one out of every three interviewees is sure to be selected. The smart wheeler-dealer concerned, pretending to be close to the Director, collected huge amounts from a large number of such candidates. He retained the money paid by the candidates who turned out to be successful and faithfully returned the money of all unsuccessful candidates. 

He was scrupulously honest about it! His system worked on the strange, but safe, principle of bleeding the meritorious and successful students, obviating, at the same time, the risk of any grievance! What helped this smart cookie was the immoderate eagerness of candidates (even more so their parents) to get in by hook or crook. The blame, however, was laid at the doorstep of the authorities who were not even aware of what was going on. 

In the end, there is no alternative to building one’s ‘merit capital’ through consistent hard work, failing which students fall prey to anxiety and are driven to desperate remedies. The choice lies between being women and men of excellence on the one hand and falling into the hands of conmen, on the other. If only the young people were as smart in their studies as conmen are in their art of taking them for a ride, the latter would have shut shop and gone home.
~DU Colleges List~

Cut-offs (2009) St. Stephen's College

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