Kerala Students Infiltrating DU, What Is Marks Jihad

Table of Contents

What has happened?

After ‘love jihad’ and ‘narcotics jihad’, it’s ‘marks jihad’.
Amid the ongoing admission process at the Delhi University, a professor has started an online campaign against “over-admission” of students from Kerala in the university,
Alleging that there is a “Leftist-jihadi conspiracy” behind it.

What the professor says?

“A college had to admit 26 students in a course having 20 seats only because they all had 100% marks from Kerala board. For last few years, Kerala board is implementing -#MarksJihad,” Rakesh Pandey, physics professor at DU’s Kirori Mal College.
There has been an “infiltration of students from Kerala in DU”.
“This is a trend we have been noticing. Kerala boards give very high marks, almost every student who comes from Kerala to seek admission in DU has 100% marks. So they cannot be denied admission, they are almost guaranteed an admission,” Pandey said.
“Most of them can’t converse in English or Hindi — the primary languages used in DU. Teachers here can’t speak in Malayalam. So then why do they come here? I think it’s a conspiracy,” he added.
Pandey alleged that this “over-admission” of students from Kerala in DU is “by design”.
“This is an organised missionary-type development. They want to come here and spread their jihadi and Leftist propaganda.
Kerala has been a hotbed of jihadi and Leftist activities, so this is a perfect way for them to spread their ideology,” he alleged.
Pandey, a former president of an RSS-linked teachers’ body National Democratic Teachers Front,
Added that the way the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) was “captured” by people from Kerala, a similar attempt is being made towards DU.
“This needs to be put an end to, we need to amend our admission criteria somehow to not allow this,” he said.

reaction

Pandey’s remarks, followed by ABVP’s protests, have created a political controversy, with the Students’ Federation of India (SFI) — the student wing of the CPI(M) — calling them “racist and communal” moves.
“The statement made by him (Pandey) makes the environment in DU for students from Kerala and all of South India very unwelcoming,” Akhil K.M., convener and Delhi state committee member of the SFI.
“This has very clear racist and communal overtones,” he added.

What Kerala is saying?

Kerala director-general of education and examination commissioner Jeevan Babu K explained the reasons behind the results, which have created ripples in Delhi.
“Against the backdrop of the pandemic situation, the examination was held in such a manner supportive to the students.
In all subjects, we have identified focus areas and the exams were held based on those focus areas. Besides, the number of questions was doubled to enable students to gain maximum marks and scores.”
The impact is apparent in the results. In 2021, as many as 502 students of the state board exam had full marks in Class XII and another 47,881 had scored above 90% with most of them above 95%.
Last year, only 18,510 students of the state board had scores above 90% and of them, only 234 had full marks (1,200 out of 1,200).
This year’s pass percentage was 87.94% as against 85.13% of 2020 and 84.33% of 2019.
“We have conducted classes for two months starting January and held the exams, both theory and practical.
Many other state boards had not even conducted the exams but granted marks to students.
When we conduct the exam during the pandemic, we can’t bring the same volume of toughness which we usually apply during an exam…”

But is it the case only with Kerala?

To be sure, students from the Kerala board are not the only ones to have who have scored high marks this year.
Over 70,000 CBSE students scored over 95%, up from 38,686 students in 2020.

What DU is saying?

The university has denied these allegations.
Vikas Gupta, the registrar of Delhi University, denied any discrimination against students from Kerala during admission, or of “over-admission” of students from the state.
“There is no discrimination against or over-admission of students from Kerala or any state board. We are very clear that our eligibility criteria is uniform for everyone. There is no basis to these allegations.”
According to a statement released by the DU registrar’s office Thursday, while 2,365 students from the Kerala board have been admitted to DU this year so far, 31,172 candidates from CBSE board have got admission.
1,540 students from the Haryana board, and 1,301 from the Rajasthan board had also got admission in DU this year.
“The University of Delhi strongly refutes and condemns the falsity of news which is being circulated regarding favouring candidates from a few boards,” the statement said.

Q) In NEP 2020, the current 10+2 system to be replaced by a new curricular structure. What is the new curricular structure?