Osmania University may do away with interviews for PhD admissions

Hyderabad: If the proposal of the Osmania University (OU) fructifies, admissions to various PhD courses in the varsity will be done without interviews from this year. All that the candidates require is a secure merit in the PhD entrance examination which will be conducted by the university. Furthermore, irrespective of the merit secured in the […]

Hyderabad: If the proposal of the Osmania University (OU) fructifies, admissions to various PhD courses in the varsity will be done without interviews from this year. All that the candidates require is a secure merit in the PhD entrance examination which will be conducted by the university.

Furthermore, irrespective of the merit secured in the National Eligibility Test (NET) and State Eligibility Test (SET), all candidates seeking PhD admission must take and secure merit in the entrance test.

The proposal to do away with interviews was discussed at length during the Deans meeting recently conducted by the university administration. The Deans were asked to submit vacancies as the university initiated steps to issue PhD admission notification.

“When interviews for Group-I recruitment are done away with, why can’t the PhD admissions be done without interviews. The plan is to do PhD admissions purely on the basis of the merit secured by candidates in the entrance examination. In addition, weightage to marks obtained by candidates in the UG and PG are also being examined to grant PhD admission. There will be no scope for favoritism towards certain students if interviews are removed,” a senior official said.

As for the current rule position, candidates with Junior Research Fellowship are given priority in the admission followed by students with NET or SET and finally an entrance test conducted by the university. Candidates seeking PhD admission should first submit a proposal which will be followed by the interviews. The last PhD admissions were done in 2018.

This apart, the university which appointed member secretary for SET is making arrangements to conduct the test once it receives accreditation from the University Grants Commission (UGC). The UGC gives the accreditation for conducting the examination for three years. Such permission was granted to the OU in 2017 that expired in 2019.