Why are Delhi University classrooms empty?

Rishabh Chauhan/ Princy Shukla/ India Today

The rain was coming down heavily when we set out to find why hundreds of Delhi University seats were vacant.

Our first stop was Bhagini Nivedita College in Kair, near Najafgarh, one of the university’s far-flung campuses that falls under the Delhi government’s fully funded umbrella of 12 colleges. The farther we travelled towards Delhi’s western edge, the quieter the roads became; the familiar bustle of central Delhi gave way to stretches of greenery and open spaces.

By the time we reached the college, the rain had left parts of the road muddy and the campus unusually quiet. But the weather was not what caught our attention. It was the number on the admission sheet.

More than 800 undergraduate seats at Bhagini Nivedita College were still vacant after two rounds of admissions.

The next stop was Satyawati College. Here, the setting was different. We were no longer at the far western edge of Delhi. Satyawati is much closer to the university’s central ecosystem, and the campus on a rainy Thursday morning was far from deserted.

Students moved through the corridors, an orientation programme was underway and there was the unmistakable activity of a new academic session beginning.

Yet the admission sheet told a similar story.

As many as 546 undergraduate seats were still vacant across Satyawati’s morning and evening shifts after the second round.

Two campuses, two very different settings, but one uncomfortable question – Why are DU seats still lying vacant when thousands of students across the country are desperate to get into the university?

The answer, as we found on the two campuses, is not as simple as poor infrastructure or weak teaching. CUET, reservation policies, and girls who still prefer to choose courses with their parents’ consent all play a role.

At Bhagini Nivedita, the problem appears to be linked to its location too, about 40 kilometres from New Delhi, changing course preferences, and the absence of a wider student ecosystem around the campus.

At Satyawati, the picture is more nuanced. Students clearly want some courses, with programmes such as Political Science and Commerce attracting admissions above their sanctioned strength, while several language and other programmes have large gaps.

Together, the two campuses reveal a larger change in the DU admission landscape.

Students do not simply want a Delhi University seat any more, they want the right Delhi University seat. And that may explain why a university that remains one of India’s most coveted undergraduate destinations can still have hundreds of empty seats.

BNC was established in 1993 to provide higher education to women from the rural and semi-urban parts of Haryana. For years, its location was closely tied to its purpose. It was meant to serve young women from nearby areas who wanted access to a Delhi University education without having to travel deep into the city.

But that local connection no longer automatically translates into student preference.

Last year, the college had 709 vacant seats against a sanctioned strength of 985, according to DU’s vacancy assessment cited by The Times of India. This year, the problem has returned.

As quoted by The Print faculty, members of different colleges confirmed that the “complex” CUET exam process is making it difficult for the seats to get filled.

“Ever since the university administration adopted a centralised admission system based on CUET, the process has been unnecessarily prolonged each year, and seats still remain vacant,” told Rajesh Jha to The Print, a professor at DU’s Rajdhani College.

The latest DU vacant-seat document, dated August 3 at 6 pm avaiable on DU’s official site, shows vacancies spread across almost every major programme at the college. In BA Programme History + Political Science, for instance, 25 UR, 34 OBC-NCL, 19 SC, 10 ST and 13 EWS seats were vacant, along with 6 PwBD seats — more than 100 vacancies across the categories listed.

BA Programme Economics + Political Science had 63 vacant seats across the listed categories, while Computer Applications + Economics had 58.

Even established programmes were affected. BA Honours Hindi had 20 UR, 16 OBC-NCL, 9 SC, 4 ST and 6 EWS vacancies. BA Honours History also had substantial vacancies across categories.

The pattern runs through combinations involving Sanskrit, History, Economics, Political Science, Computer Applications and Music.

For Principal Ruby Mishra, who joined the college 11 months ago, part of the answer lies in changing student aspirations. “New programmes and courses are now being sought after by students, as they are prioritising skill-based education, and the existing structure is finding it difficult to cater to this demand,” she told India Today.