Students of Film and Television Institute of India (FTII) in Pune held a protest against discrepancies in the merit list and non-implementation of reservation rules in the admission process, on Friday.
“The Film and Television Institute of India published their final merit list for the academic year 2021 on 26/07/2022. It is painfully visible for us to see that yet again, the authorities have made a gross mockery of the provisions of Reservation by which these admissions are to take place,” read the press statement by the FTII Students Association (FTIISA).
“Many seats as well as wait list positions in the OBC, SC and ST categories have not been filled, citing reasons of ineligibility,” students alleged.
The student body went on to say: “When questioned, the authorities mentioned that many candidates did not pass their cut off percentages (45% for OBC (NCL) and Gen EWS, 40% for SC and ST and Gen PwD and 50% for General). There is no transparency about how these figures are arrived upon and by whom, not to mention that the validity of this criteria is questionable by itself.”
As a consequence of this arbitrary rule, every year the authorities can claim that they did not find suitable candidates in these categories and fill in the reserved seats with students from the General category, students from India’s premier film institute said.
According to the student body, it is also highly questionable why only candidates from the General category are able to clear their cut off, while those from other categories aren’t. “By this process, the seats supposed to be left open for all in the General category also remain closed for those from other categories,” they alleged.
The statement further noted: “The Orientation and Interview process accounts for 80% of the total grade for the admission in our institute. This leaves the process ambiguous to those who want to question the reasons with which some candidates have been deemed ineligible. Even so, it is evident that a bias exists in how candidates are evaluated and deemed ineligible as our reserved seats remain unoccupied by aspirants from those categories across different departments. Additionally, the Orientation and Interview was conducted online this time, highlighting further inequalities with which candidates were attempting their admission.
In the larger concern of following the Reservation policy, similar irregularities recur in the faculty recruitment of our institute.”
 in Pune held a protest against discrepancies in the merit list and non-implementation of reservation rules in the admission process, on Friday.){kind=link}