4,440 extra seats await degree college aspirants in Mumbai this year

Students taking admissions to degree colleges affiliated to University of Mumbai (MU) in Arts, Science and Commerce streams will likely have 4,440 more seats to choose from this year.

The additional seats will be available 22 new colleges that are set to start classes from the upcoming academic year. The varsity management council decided to grant affiliation to 22 new colleges, including seven law schools and 15 traditional arts-science-commerce institutes. The colleges are now awaiting approval from the state, which is likely to come in the next few weeks.

These seats will increase the combined intake for undergraduate courses of the three faculties at MU to 2.93 lakh — 58,232 for arts, 1,66,977 for commerce and 68,219 for science. All the new seats belong to popular courses such as BA, BCom, BSc, Bachelor of Mass Media (BMM), BSc Information Technology (IT), BSc Computer Science (CS), BCom Accounting and Finance (A&F) and Bachelor of Management Studies (BMS).

More seats will be added in the existing institutes during the admissions after the varsity and the state approve additional divisions in the colleges. While some academicians believe there are sufficient seats for all the students pursuing higher education after Class 12, others believe that the intake for the self-financed courses doesn't match the growing demand for these courses.

“Students are increasingly moving from traditional BA, BCom and BSc to self-financed courses. There aren't enough seats for these courses, especially for BCom A&F,” said Asgar Lakdawala, principal, Royal College, Mira Road.

However, Chaitali Chakraborty, principal, Thakur College, Kandivli, said that the stiff competition for self-financed course seats is becuase of the students' preference for certain colleges. “All the students want to get into the top colleges. If you are to choose a bottom-rung college, there will always be a seat for you,” she said.

Principals said they expect the demand for self-financed courses to continue.“The students are increasingle preferring BSc IT and BSc CS over engineering,” said Chakraborty.

The also hoped that MU sticks to its admission schedule, which will continue till June 25 so that classes begin on time.

“Adhering of the schedule is important since it provides the framework to regulate the process after the enrolment by students,” said Dr Hemlata Bagla, principal, KC College, Churchgate. “If everything goes as per the schedule, the colleges should start the new academic session between June 25 and July 2,” added Parag Thakkar, principal of HR College, Churchgate.

Meanwhile, a few colleges such as NM College, Vile Parle, are conducting awareness workshops for students to understand the various programmes, and to bring clarity to their decision-making.