Expat students looking to apply to India’s engineering and technical colleges need only to show proof of two years of studies in their foreign country of residence, the Delhi High Court ruled earlier week this week.
According to Gulf News, the ruling came to the relief of protesting parents who were chafed when the Indian government changed the Direct Admission for Students Abroad criteria – instead of the mandatory two years, students were required to show a minimum of five years of study abroad, a move that affected many Indian expat students in the Gulf countries.
Sumeet Baruah’s son, Rohil, is a student at Delhi Private School in Sharjah, UAE where Sumeet is working in a multinational.
The majority of school students in #Dubai are from India, followed by the UAE, Pakistan, Egypt & UK #DubaiFutureEd pic.twitter.com/O94jiF9B41
— KHDA | هيئة المعرفة والتنمية البشرية بدبي (@KHDA) May 23, 2017
Sumeet was relieved and thrilled by the ruling of the High Court, which directed the government to amend the new eligibility criteria. Had the ruling not reinstated the two-year rule, Rohil, who had secured the perfect 2,400 Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) score, would not have been eligible to apply as the Baruahs were only in the UAE for two years, making it impossible for Rohil to prove he had five years of overseas study.
While relieved, other parents like Sumeet feel the admissions process could be improved if there is a website where parents can get their queries answered.
Indian parents working in Gulf countries are now on their own without much guidance from the institutions or the government when it comes to their children’s university admission process – they rely on their own blogs for information on this issue. When they approach the technical institute in Nagpur for queries on admissions, they are left in the cold or directed to a list of Frequent Asked Questions (FAQs) on their website instead.
“With fast-changing rules, we have new queries and would want the officials to provide solutions through regularly updated blog. But we are struggling with so many doubts,” another parent said.
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