The examination was conducted on February 18. (Express File Photo)
RESULTS of Joint Entrance Test (JET) held for admissions to Film and Television Institute of India (FTII) and Satyajeet Ray Film and Television Institute (SRFTI) were declared on Sunday. The results were announced by a private firm that had conducted the first such test for the two institutes. The examination was held on February 18, and was taken by 5,293 aspirants across the country for 11 courses at Pune-based FTII and 12 courses at Kolkata-based SRFTI in film, television and new media fields.
However, the administration’s decision to withhold the cut-off percentile for the institutes led to confusion among the aspirants since it was not apparent to them — despite knowing their own percentile — if they were eligible for the subsequent phases of admission process. While the scorecards were put up on the JET portal on Sunday morning, the FTII administration waited till afternoon to clarify on social media that FTII and SRFTI will declare their own cut-off thresholds for shortlisting the candidates for interview process “in coming week”, leaving the aspirants uncertain about their future.
“I saw my result in the morning but it wasn’t clear to me if I was eligible for the next stage or not. Since it was a Sunday, we couldn’t even call the institute for clarification. Because we did not get any email about selection — FTII used to do till last year — many of us presumed that we did not make the cut. It was later in the day when a message was posted on the social media by the FTII informing that the shortlist would be published next week that I got some hope,” said a student who is vying for admission in film direction course.
Another student who has applied for screenplay writing course said the JET seems to be following the pattern of CAT (Common Admission Test) held by Indian Institutes of Management (IIM), which announces the percentiles following which each of 20 IIMs publishes their own cut off marks.
“There are as many as 20 IIMs, here we have just two institutes. They could have easily announced the cut-off percentile on the same day to avoid this confusion among aspirants,” said the aspirant who has a masters degree in English Literature. He said the confusion was compounded as it was not known how many aspirants have applied for each course. FTII Director Bhupendra Kainthola, when contacted for clarification, did not respond. Last month, FTII had declined an RTI query by The Indian Express seeking information about number of applications received for various courses at FTII and SRFTI this year.