Domicile relaxation adds to management candidates? stress

Updated on: Thursday, June 16, 2011

The state government’s relaxation of the domicile certificate requirement for admissions to professional courses has been widely welcomed, but it has nevertheless left candidates lined up for management courses confused. The relaxation order came on Monday, well after the start of the admission process for management courses. So, students who have failed to procure domicile certificates and have filled their forms in the outside Maharashtra state (OMS) category are not sure of how their forms would now be sorted out.

A parent said, “Several students were told to fill the forms as OMS candidates when they could not procure domicile certificates. Monday’s directive does not say what happens to these students. My son scored 98% in the entrance test. But he was forced to fill the form as an outside student. How does the directorate of technical education (DTE) plan to sort out these forms?” The relaxation means that a student born in the state can secure admission by producing only a birth certificate. But a student who has lived in Maharashtra for more than 10 years but was not born here still needs to submit a domicile certificate.

A student who has applied in the OMS category said, “I was not born in Maharashtra but have stayed here for more than 15 years. Students like me still have to procure domicile certificates. In any case, the state should have given the relaxation much earlier. Tehsildar offices (which issue the certificates) would have been able to process the applications faster had there been fewer of them.”

SK Mahajan, director in charge, DTE, said, “Not more than 1, 100 candidates were unable to submit the required documents. (Giving such candidates more time) we extended the dates of form submission by a week.” The relaxation came after the government realised that procuring domicile certificates was tedious and time-consuming for students. Also, it was becoming difficult for the revenue department (under which tehsildar offices come) to process the glut of applications. The new rule is that for a student who has neither a domicile nor a birth certificate, the school-leaving certificate should mention the place of birth as one within Maharashtra. Students failing to satisfy this norm would need to apply under the OMS category.

AFFIRMATIVE ACTION

In January 2010, the state government made domicile certificates mandatory for candidates seeking admission to professional courses in Maharashtra

The certificate would be proof that a candidate had been a resident of Maharashtra for 10 years

As the requirement was introduced late in the 2009-10 academic year, the technical education department put it on hold till 2010-11

The government introduced the requirement to effectively make available more seats in professional courses to students from within the state

It relaxed the requirement for candidates born in the state since it was proving to be an inconvenience

ROAD AHEAD

Provisional merit lists will be displayed in management colleges on June 16

The grievance period has been rescheduled to June 20-23 from June 17-18

The domicile requirement relaxation will not have much effect on the admission process for the engineering, medical and pharmacy streams since MHT-CET results have been announced

Domicile relaxation adds to management candidates? stress

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