EduNews: IITJEE Main 2018 cut-off score is lowest ever

The cut-off score used for this year's IIT JEE Main to determine general category candidate's eligibility for JEE Advanced is the lowest ever and caps a four-year downward trend.

Professors at the IIT, which admit students on the basis of their JEE Advanced scores, suggested two possible reasons. One: an increase in available IIT seats; Two: top students' growing preference for non-engineering courses such as medicine. All those who scored more than 74 in the IIT JEE Main, out of a total marks of 360,will be allowed to take the JEE Advanced 2018.

Year	Cut-off score (out of 360) for JEE Advanced
2018	74
2017	81
2016	100
2015	105
2014	115
2013	113

When JEE Main and JEE Advanced were started in 2013, the cut-off used was 113. This increased to 115 the following year but has been falling every year since then.

Dr.Panigrahi of IIT Kharagpur and former JEE Advanced chairperson, said that in 2013, the IITs wanted the 1.5 lakh best IIT JEE Main candidates to take the JEE Advanced. In 2018, they want 2.2 lakh to do so. This could be because the institutes along with their seats have increased from about 9500 in 2013 to almost 12000 now.

Also, the number of students taking IITJEE Main has been declining from 13 lakh in 2013 to about 11 lakh in 2018. "Demand for engineering courses is falling. Large numbers of seats remain vacant in engineering colleges," Rajeev Kumar former professor of IIT Kharagpur now in JNU, said.

This fact is also supported by the data since number of students taking the NEET (National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test), which determines admission to undergraduate medical and dental courses, has grown from 8 lakh in 2016 to 13 lakh in 2018.

(Source: Telegraph, edited)

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