The engineering aspirants will have to check the results of the Bengal joint entrance examinations on www.wbjeeb.nic.in and www.wbjeeb.in on August 7.

JEE board registrar Dibyendu Kar said the results could be checked from 2.30pm on Friday. The candidates will be able to download the rank cards from these websites.

The board will hold a press meet through video-conference at its office in Salt Lake at 1pm on Friday to announce the results.

Recently, some officials of the JEE board tested positive for Covid-19, casting a shadow on the publication of the results. The exams were held in early February.

About 88,000 students had written the exam for admission to engineering colleges on February 2 as the JEE board had advanced it by two months so that colleges had more time to fill their seats.

The schedule for online counselling will be announced on the day of the results. The number of seats stands at 33,000. Private engineering colleges set aside 10 per cent of the seats for students who crack the JEE-Main.

These students, too, take part in the online counselling. But this year the JEE-Main has been pushed back to September. The JEE board is likely to hold counselling for these students separately, said a board official.

This year, the number of applicants had come down to 89,000 from 1,13,912 last year, a drop that academics attributed to waning interest in engineering courses.