JEE board announces counselling guidelines 

The state joint entrance examination board on Wednesday announced the guidelines for e-counselling and seat allotment for admission to the BTech programme.

The schedule for the counselling is likely to be announced by the end of this week, said a board official.

The e-counselling is likely to begin from July 10. The results were announced on June 6.

The guidelines say there will be combined counselling for the students whose names figure on the merit lists of the West Bengal Joint Entrance Examinations (WBJEE) and the JEE (Main).

JEE Main is primarily conducted by the National Testing Agency (NTA) to admit students to the NITs. Ten per cent of the seats in the state’s private engineering colleges are reserved for those who have cracked JEE-Main.

There will be three rounds of counselling — allotment, choice upgrade and mop-up.

Registration will be allowed at the beginning of the allotment and mop-up rounds, JEE board registrar Dibyendu Kar said.

Till 2022, registration was only allowed at the beginning of the allotment round.

The system was changed from last year to attract more students and ensure fewer seats remained vacant, said a board official.

Even last year Jadavpur University had to conduct independent counselling to fill 138 of its 1,253 BTech seats that had remained vacant after the centralised counselling.

Calcutta University, too, had to hold independent counselling because 68 of its 253 BTech seats did not have any takers.

“Any candidate who meets the eligibility criteria and has secured a rank (GMR) in the WBJEE-2024 and/or JEE (Main)-2024 exams can register for counselling. There will be three rounds of counselling: allotment, upgradation, and mop-up. Candidates are allowed to register at the beginning of round I and the mop-up round. Registration for counselling is required to secure a seat,” says a notification.

All the private and government engineering colleges which come under the ambit of Maulana Abul Kalam Azad University of Technology (MAKAUT), Jadavpur University, Calcutta University and some private universities which run BTech courses, will take part in the counselling.

All candidates who were allotted seats, paid seat acceptance fees either in round I or round II, but did not take admission or who were not allotted seats in round 1 or round II, can take part in the mop-up round.

A new candidate having a valid rank either in WBJEE-2024 and/or JEE (Main)-2024 can register at the mop-up round.

Registrar Kar said this year they have dropped a process called mock seat allotment, which was a practice round, aimed to give the candidates an idea about the allotment process.

“But when the results of the actual allotment differed from the practice round, many candidates last year got confused.”