IIMB admissions hampered due to SC ruling on OBC reservation

Bangalore, Apr 10 (UNI) The laborious work done by the Indian Institute of Management-Bangalore (IIM-B) turned out to be a waste with today's apex court order allowing 27 per cent reservation for OBCs in Centrally-administered institutions of higher learning.

The Institute had just completed the work for admitting students following the CAT examinations for the current academic year and was set to send offer letters from tomorrow. However, it will have to do the process all over again.

Speaking to reporters, IIM-B Director Pankaj Chandra said the admission process would now depend on the government's next move.

''We do not have a clear idea what the government will do.

The Institute has very little information on the government's next move, It will be difficult to accommodate OBC category students immediately if the government wants us to do so,'' he said.

He said it would take several weeks to do the process again and May-end start of the preparatory courses for students from other faculty would be difficult.

Mr Chandra said all the IIM heads would meet soon and take a stand on the issue. As decided earlier it would be better to make the OBC admissions under a phased manner, he said.

He said though students, who took CAT, were asked to specify if they belonged to OBC but it would be difficult to say how many had actually made it past the interview phase.

Chairman of Admissions Subashish Gupta said the institute was not sure how to exclude the creamy layer or whether the OBC students would be admitted without additional interviews. ''We cannot set a deadline for the admission process unless the government issues a notification,'' he said.

Out of the 270 seats this year, 183 was for general, 40 for SC, 20 for ST, 19 for OBC and eight for disabled persons.

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