OBC students’ odds improve as IITs implement full quota

The number of OBC (other backward classes) candidates appearing for the joint entrance examination (JEE) of the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) has gone up only marginally from 2009, when the category had seen a 44% rise.

With the older IITs implementing 27% reservation for the OBCs from this year, the numbers were expected to rise substantially, but the list of candidates who have registered for the JEE presents a different picture.

“Approximately 1.08 lakh OBCs [non-creamy layer] have registered in 2010,” said professor TS Natarajan of IIT Madras, chairman of the JEE organising committee. “Last year, 1.07 lakh had registered. But it’s good for these aspirants. There will be more seats this year, while the number of those competing for them has not gone up much. This will increase their probability of getting through if they work hard.”

The IITs can relax the cut-offs for OBC candidates by 10%. The total number of seats reserved for OBCs across all IITs, IT-BHU and ISM-Dhanbad is about 2,700; in other words, 27% of the nearly 10,000 IIT seats. In all, 4.72 lakh candidates have registered for JEE 2010. In 2009, around 1,949 had qualified for admission to 1,594 seats. But 51 OBC seats were converted to general category as enough OBC candidates could not make the cut.

“It’s difficult to predict how many will qualify this year and whether the number will be enough to fill all OBC seats,” said Natarajan.
One expert said that while there was a spurt in the number of reserved category candidates last year, the rise is bound to taper off as a saturation point is certain to be reached. Thereafter, the increase in number of candidates will be similar across categories.

Another said the availability of other “decent” engineering institutes and their proximity to one’s residence could be a reason for the marginal rise in number of candidates. “Besides IITs, there are other channels which enable students to go abroad now,” said the academician.

Gautam Barua, IIT Guwahati director, said the number of students applying for admission cannot keep jumping every year. “It won’t increase dramatically either in the next few years,” he said. “We still have more OBCs applying than the number of seats available. The main worry is SCs and STs. It is part of a larger social problem.”