BITSAT poses tough competition
By Ruchi Shrimali
About 1.36 lakh students have registered for BITSAT 2012, which is to be held on May 10. The candidates will compete for 2000 seats in degree courses offered by Birla Institute of Technology and Science at Pilani, Hyderabad and Goa. Hence, BITSAT will see an average of 68 students competing for each seat. The figure trumps the competition density of IIT JEE 2012, which was held on April 8.
BITSAT 2012 will be conducted online from May 10 to June 9 at 32 centres across India.
Competition densities for prominent national engineering entrance exams are as follows:
- About 5.2 lakh students had appeared for IIT JEE 2012. It saw around 54 candidates competing for each of the 9,600 seats on offer by all the IITs, IT-BHU and ISM Dhanbad.
- VITEEE 2012, which was conducted on April 21, saw 48 students competing for each seat. Vellore Institute of Technology offers 3,100 seats and about 1.5 lakh students across India had appeared for its engineering entrance exam.
- About 11 lakh students took the All Indian Engineering Entrance Exam (AIEEE) 2012 competing for about 35,000 seats offered across 31 NITs. AIEEE scores are also accepted by 50 other private and government engineering colleges across India. Here, 31 students competed for each available seat.
- Engineering entrance exams conducted by private and deemed universities have also strengthened over the years. Manipal University saw 27 applicants competing for each of its engineering seat offered this year, while SRM University had 22 candidates competing for each of its engineering seats. See details
BITSAT pushes ahead of the game
Since BITS has fewer seats, its student-to-seat ratio is higher than IITs pushing it to the No. 1 slot in the number game. BITSAT, introduced only in 2005, rapidly gained popularity, now even appearing more competitive than IIT JEE.
Earlier, BITS Pilani used to admit students on the basis of their Class XII marks. IIT JEE has limited the number of attempts by an individual student to two since 2007. On the other hand, BITSAT has lowered its eligibility criteria from 80 per cent to 75 per cent marks in board exams.
Moreover, BITSAT is completely based on NCERT curriculum followed by CBSE schools, which makes it easier for school students than IIT JEE.
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