Merger of JEE and AIEEE will lower IIT standards: FIITJEE

Updated on: Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Leading engineering tutorial institute FIITJEE voiced concerns over the proposed move of the government to merge the IITJEE and AIEEE exams and claimed it could lower the quality of prestigious IIT’s.

“This decision will lower the standards of IIT. Already, IIT's have been criticised for lack of quality and this decision may be a big blow as we do not know what change will follow in the opening and closing ranks of IITs,” R L Trikha, Director of FIITJEE Limited, told reporters here.

“JEE was a major factor that gave IIT's the exclusivity that they command today. A student preparing for JEE prepared for the test with the sole purpose of entering IIT and not a regional engineering college,” he said.

The recent decision of the Union Ministry of Human Resource and Development of merging IIT Joint Entrance Exams (JEE) and All India Engineering Entrance Exams (AIEEE) has stirred mixed reaction among students and academicians.

If everything falls in place, by 2013, there will be a common entrance test for all government engineering colleges. Another significant change is that along with the test scores, a student's 12th standard marks will have 40 per cent weightage.

“School boards like CBSE, ICSE are easier to score than compared to state boards. This is unfair to students appearing for state boards compared to CBSE. For states like Bihar, the state board awards lower marks than the national boards,” Trikha contended.

He suggested a better option would be to have multiple rounds of screening tests, rather than giving 40 per cent weightage to 12th standard results.

“There is also a need for uniform syllabus, since different boards have different marking systems, which needs to be standardised. And lastly, students will face immense pressure as there's a single exam to make it or break it,” the FIITJEE official said.

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