The three-round online counselling for admission to the BTech programme, which starts on August 12, will continue till October 28, the state joint entrance examination board has said.

The board has put up the counselling schedule on its website www.wbjeeb.nic.in.

The first round of registration, uploading of testimonials such as board exam marks and mentioning the choice can be done from August 12 to 25. The choice for a specific institute can be locked from August 25 to 28.

The first round of seat allotment results will be announced on August 31.

An engineering aspirant can accept the allotted seats and make payment for provisional admission from August 31 to September 6.

If the aspirant does not accept the choice and opts for an upgrade, a round of in-cycle upgrade will be held on September 7. A candidate can accept the upgraded seat and make payment for provisional admission from September 7 to 9.

“If a candidate does not accept the upgraded choice, he or she can go for further upgrade in the next round of counselling, which will start on September 11,” said a JEE board official.

The third and final round of online counselling will start on October 6, said JEE board vice-chairman Dilip Mitra. “The process will end on October 28. We will have at least three rounds of counselling. Any change in schedule will be uploaded on the portal.”

This year, a candidate whose name features on the state JEE merit list can participate in counselling in every round.

The JEE board will hold a separate round of counselling for students who will crack the JEE Main exams, which are scheduled for the first week of September.

The board this year will hold counselling in two phases, unlike previous years when it was held in one phase.

The decision to postpone the JEE Main, usually held in April, because of the Covid-19 pandemic has prompted the board to stagger the counselling in two phases.

The NITs and the IIEST, Shibpur, are among the institutes that admit students through JEE-Main.

This year the candidates don’t have to visit “reporting centres” to get their testimonials verified before ad-mission because the pand-emic has forced the state

JEE board to conduct the process online, a board official said.