Hindu College says No to ECA Quota

New Delhi: Hindu College has announced that there will be no admissions through the ECA (Extra Curricular Activity) quota this year. The college posted a notice on July 4 on its website, informing applicants through the ECA quota that there would be no admissions under the category, as per the instructions of the Chairman of the Governing Body.

The college has said that there were reports of corruption and rigging of these admissions, and hence it has disallowed these admissions. The applicants can collect the refund of the application fee from the college by showing the acknowledgement slip.

There is 5 % reservation for students who apply through the ECA and Sports quota, which offers a chance for students who excel in extracurricular activities and sports to secure a seat in the college, irrespective of their marks. With cut off marks soaring too high, many students relied on the ECA quota to get admission to the esteemed college.

Souparnika Krishnan, one such student who had applied to ECA quota for debating as well as creative writing, says “This is very unfair. Instead of scrapping off the whole process, they should have taken care of the issue internally and taken action against those at fault. Why should applicants be made to suffer?”

After the announcement, the cultural societies of the college, which represent the college for extracurricular activities, sympathise with the applicants. Tanvi Kaul, vice president of Srijya, the choreography society at Hindu College says, “We don’t have a say in the matter. Besides the ECA applicants, we conduct auditions after college opens formally, and also select new members from among all the students in the college. The students who are keen on representing the college can still join us, but admission to the college in the first place has become difficult for them now.”

The cut off marks for the college are as high as 97% for admission to B.Com(Hons.) and 96.5% for admission to English (Hons). Admissions to the departments of Political Science, History, Hindi and Sanskrit have already been closed for the General category after the first cut off list.