Thousands of students from the Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University Hyderabad (JNTUH) continue to be affected as the administration has decided to do away with the perks of providing grace marks and subject exemption to the R18 BTech batch.
JNTUH had earlier provided the benefits of awarding grace marks to those students of batches R05, R07, R09, R13, R15, and R16, who were falling short of a few marks to pass one or two subjects. By adding specified grace marks, these students would be able to pass these one or two subjects and secure sufficient credits to obtain their provisional degree certificate.
Additionally, if a student acquires sufficient credits for the issue of a provisional certificate as per their academic regulations, and fails in one or two subjects, then the student can forgo the performance in these failed subjects and can apply for the issue of the provisional certificate. However, the same benefits were not mentioned in the official academic regulatory paper for the R18 batch.
Why are students demanding these perks?
Students from the R18 batch at the University informed EdexLive that their future is at stake here because if they are not awarded these perks then many of them will lose out on securing jobs and pursuing further education abroad.
While elaborating on the reasons for the need for grace marks, a student who studies in a JNTUH-affiliated college and wished to stay anonymous said, “Our batch had to deal with the consequences of COVID. Classes were not held properly and we wrote the fourth and sixth-semester exams together, so we didn’t do well in the exams,” he said. The results are, therefore, not up to the mark. “In some cases, students also scored zeros in their results,” the student said.
Some students said that they fell short of the passing score by just a few marks and their whole future would be in jeopardy because of this. “I have only one backlog with 22 marks and pass marks is 26 so I can go for grace marks or else subject exemption,” a student who wished to stay anonymous said.
Another student belonging to JNTUH said that although he had plans of joining Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), he is yet to get his joining letter as he has to first clear his backlogs.
In fact, similar issues plagued the R16 batch as well. “They didn’t mention that these benefits won’t be given. They also protested demanding that the benefits were given to the R15 batch but not to them. So eventually, the management ended up agreeing,” said Shahazan Khan, who runs the social media page titled “Jntuh updates” (@examupdt) on Twitter, which is known for sharing updates about JNTUH regularly.
Future plans halted…
Many students expressed outrage as they have also been rejected by companies that they secured jobs in through the placement process on campus. “I got into two reputed companies — Accenture and Wipro. Accenture rejected me and Wipro has kept me on hold because I still have a backlog in one subject,” a student from a JNTUH-affiliated college told EdexLive. Although he tried to look for alternatives like applying abroad for pursuing master's, he still needs to clear his arrears to submit all the required documents for the application process.
Students also said that many of them have to submit transcripts to their respective universities abroad for the spring semester which will begin from January 2023. “However, universities will not consider the documents if there are even one or two backlogs,” a student said. If a subject exemption and grace marks won’t be granted, then students will have to re-write the exam and wait for the results which will take more than two to three months from now, the student added.
Another student’s plans to pursue master's in the same field has been put on hold because of one backlog. “I have one backlog and if in case I fail to pass that exam, my admission will get cancelled and my father has already paid one lakh for it with so much difficulty,” the final-year student said.
Students of JNTUH and students associations like the National Students’ Union of India (NSUI) protested on the campus yesterday, August 23 in support of the R18 BTech batch. As the students protested, Venkat Balmoor, President of the NSUI said that the police launched a lathi-charge on them which was “absolutely unnecessary.” Students also took to Twitter with the hashtag #jntuhsubjectexemption to draw attention to their demands.
When EdexLive reached out to a JNTUH official earlier, he claimed that the regulations were not introduced this year. “The revised regulations were informed at the time of admission in 2018 itself and it is not that it was done suddenly,” he said.
