Maharashtra: More applicants for 5-year law course despite late admissions | Bombay News

Admissions to state law schools ended in the last week of April and, surprisingly, five-year law courses have seen a drop in vacancies this year. Information shared by the state’s Common Entrance Test (CET) cell showed how 6,864 of the 10,440 available seats in state law schools for the five-year LLB were filled this year ( only 34.25% of vacant seats), much better than in recent years when the vacancy rate was between 48% and 60%.

“Each year after the end of admissions, we [law colleges] witness to many reshuffles among students who end up withdrawing from one institute and applying to another. This year, since the whole process has been delayed and extended over a period of two and a half months, the students are not withdrawing their admissions and this could have resulted in more admissions, ”said the director of a faculty of commuter law.

Almost 16,200 students took the state exam for the five-year law course in October 2020. Admissions to most professional courses, however, have been delayed this year and law has been hit the hardest. . Admissions that did not start until January 2020 were marred by several errors, ultimately extending the admissions process until April of this year. While speakers are excited to see an increase in admissions to law schools, many believe the number is still very low compared to the registrations received this year.

“If 16,000 students have passed the law school entrance exam, how can only 6,800 confirm seats? Obviously, the delay in admissions has prompted more students to opt for seats in neighboring states where admissions were made without too much delay, ”said Sachin Pawar, Chair of the Student Law Council. He added that the state’s decision to continue to extend law entry dates has cost many aspirants their futures.

Last month, Minister of State for Higher and Technical Education Uday Samant called for additional admission cycles for the three-year law course, where more than 767 seats remained vacant after cycles of online and offline admission. These additional rounds were conducted by the state CET cell between April 23-29, but final data on vacancies in the three-year law course has yet to be made available by the admission body.

Despite Samant’s verbal assurances, giving first-year law students and colleges more time to complete their program for the current academic year, students are concerned that colleges will manage to complete the program, even with extra time. . “Instead of the nine to ten months that colleges typically have to complete the entire year portion, our batch will be four or five months, if we’re lucky. We fear exams because in most cases colleges have only now started online courses for the first year, ”said Ashutosh Sairam, a freshman LLB (five years).