Aspiring IITians will now have to cough up 15 per cent more fees after the new rule regarding entrance examinations for the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs). Fees for a two-year IIT coaching programme currently costs anywhere between Rs 1.2 lakh and Rs 1.8 lakh.

After weeks of controversy regarding a single entrance exam for engineering programs at IITs, the IIT Council has declared students will have to be in the top 20 per cent in the Board exams, and will have to clear the IIT-JEE (Joint Entrance Examination) - both main and advanced, to qualify for IITs.

“Earlier, a student would know based on his performance whether he would qualify for IIT or not, but now it is relative to others’ performance, so he wouldn’t mind doing a little more to get more marks and reach the top 20 per cent, Mr Gautam Puri, cofounder of Career Launcher, said.

IIT-JEE training programmes typically include training for both Board exams and IIT-JEE but tests are given only for the JEE, so now we will have to start test series for Board exams as well and will charge additional fees for that, he said.

Kota-based Career Point too would conduct more tests for the board exams, and would “definitely increase fees for students,” Mr Pramod Maheshwari, Chief Executive Officer of the company said, adding that they would also put more pressure on students to do well in the Board examinations. Also, now that the Board exam percentage is given more importance, more students will opt for private tuitions to fall into the eligibility criteria, he added.

“Coaching institutes will be positively affected, and most institutes will now start giving integrated coaching programs, and hike fees,” Mr A.R.K.S. Srinivas, former Director of T.I.M.E Mumbai and CEO of coaching institute VistaMind, said.

Institutes would also tie up with colleges to offer coaching or most of them would soon start their own pre-university colleges for Class 12 and provide IIT training as part of the package, he added.

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