While colleges affiliated to the University of Mumbai have been complaining of dwindling student numbers in commerce, the Institute of Distance and Open Learning (IDOL) has shown an upward trend in enrolments in the subject this year.
As admissions to the institute draw to a close, it will see an almost 15 to 20 per cent increase in admission to both the under-graduate (B.Com) and post-graduate (M.Com) courses. Although authorities claim that the trend is due to the non-existence of criteria like requisite attendance and a high fee, students say it is the best way to circumvent submission of projects which are made compulsory under the credit based system adopted by colleges.
“Though there are still 10 days left (for admissions to end), we have already seen enrolment touch 72,303 and there are about 7,000-8,000 students who are expected to take admission by the last date,” said Dr D. Harichandan, director of IDOL.
“While overall the admission trends to courses has been similar to last year, enrolments in the commerce stream have seen a huge jump in both the under-graduate and post-graduate courses for commerce,” he added.
Although students admitted to the attendance issue, they said the other reason for their choice of courses was the credit-based system that they wanted to escape. “The credit based system is semester based and in every semester we have to submit projects that carry 40 marks. As it is cumbersome and time consuming, I decided to opt for IDOL as it is still following the old pattern wherein there is no project submission nor are there dual exams in a year,” said Pradip Pudhalkar, a student.