As the University of Delhi is set to release its first cutoffs on June 24, the analysis of the 2.78 lakh applications received this year for the admissions has revealed a surprising trend. Economics Honours is all set to witness the highest cutoff to get admission into. Unexpectedly nearly 1.58 lakh admission seekers of a total of 2.78 lakh applicants have sought Economics Honours. With over 1.02 lakh applications, the second-most preferred course is BTech in Computer Science. English, however, is surprisingly nowhere in the top ranks, which used to one of the five most sought-after courses in the university.
English Honours which used to feature in the list of top five sought-after courses now doesn’t even feature in the top 10. Subjects like History, Mathematics, French and Sanskrit have taken over the course by huge margins. According to the data, English (H) has received only 58,201 applications which is a lakh applications lesser than the total applications for Economics (H). Sanskrit, on the other hand, has received 78,135 applications.
This has come as a big shocker for principals of various colleges as well. Principal of Hindu College, Dr Pradumn Kumar said, “It is very surprising that such few applications have come in for English (H). We have always seen a very good response to this course and this dip is really strange. However, it is possible that most of the English (H) crowd has opted for BTech in Computer Science and other such courses.”
Cutoffs are now expected to soar for Economics Honours as such a big margin has never been seen before. Kumar said that it is likely that the cutoff for Economics (H) hovers around 98-99 per cent.
“It is clear that the cutoffs for Economics will be all time high. Especially in colleges like Shri Ram College of Commerce (SRCC), Hindu College, lady Shri Ram College (lSR), the cutoffs will close at 99 per cent. However, I can only give an analysis for the first cutoff,” he said and added that English may not see an increase or decrease in cutoff from last year. “In the first list, it is definite that the cutoffs will not dip. But they may dip later on. Every college has limited seats so we can’t straight away dip the cutoffs as we have to be over cautious. Even cutoffs for Computer Science are expected to remain above 95 per cent with over a lakh applicants rooting for it,” informed Kumar.