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IIT-Kanpur ‘threat’ fails to move Sibal

The human resource development ministry is not happy with the decision of IIT-Kanpur's senate to reject the centre's 'one-nation, one-test' proposal and conduct its own entrance examination from 2013.

Highly placed sources in HRD Ministry told Millennium Post, 'What IIT-Kanpur is doing is just resorting to pressure tactics. In fact, it has gone beyond its brief. For the decision it has taken, IIT would require the approval of board of governors.'

The source in the ministry adds, 'This exam would not be held as an IIT entrance examination, but solely as an IIT-Kanpur entrance examination for which not many students would appear for.'

The IIT clan too seems divided over HRD ministry's 'one-nation, one-test' plan. The engineering institutes in Guwahati and Kharagpur have been opposing IIT-Kanpur's decision to reject the centre's idea and conduct its own entrance exam from next year.

Reportedly, during it's meeting, the senate of IIT-Kanpur had said that the IIT Council's recent proposal on admissions is 'academically and methodically unsound' and decided to veto it. As per the statement issued by Somnath Bharti, the president of IIT Delhi Alumni Association, IIT-Delhi would, in all likelihood, follow IIT Kanpur's example as well.

Earlier on 28 May, HRD minister Kapil Sibal had announced that from next year students aspiring to qualify for IITs and other central institutes, like NITs and IIITs, would have to appear for a new format of common entrance test. This test would also take into consideration the 12th standard school board results of the students.

Sibal claimed that this proposal was approved unanimously, as the council consisted of the IITs, the IIITs and the NITs. He also asserted that this idea had the support of senates of four of the seven IITs, including senates of IIT Guwahati, Kharagpur, Madras, Roorkee and Bombay.
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