Uncertainty prevails over SET results

PUNE, May 12: Uncertainty prevails over the declaration of results of the sixth State Eligibility Test SET conducted by the University of ...

PUNE, May 12: Uncertainty prevails over the declaration of results of the sixth State Eligibility Test SET conducted by the University of Pune UoP on January 25 this year. Nearly 7,000 students who appeared for the examination from all over the State have been subjected to a prolonged wait simply because the University Grants Commission UGC is cooling its heels over granting accreditation to the UoP for conducting the examination from 1998 onwards.

The results which should have been declared in March have been postponed and according to highly placed sources in the SET cell of the UoP, it is likely to be declared in the first week of June. However by then several post-graduate students are likely to suffer a setback in their teaching career with interviews for lecturers8217; post already underway in April and May.

The University of Pune was entrusted with the responsibility of conducting SET since 1995 which is mandatory for eligibility as university and college teachers. SET was also mandatory for such lecturers who were in service since 1989 but did not have a M Phil or Ph D. Post-graduate students were also eligible to appear for SET conducted in 30-odd subjects.

With the three-year accreditation given to the UoP having ended in 1997, an UGC review committee had visited the UoP on March 17 and 18 this year which later submitted its report to the UGC chairperson. However with no reply from the UGC, the declaration of results of the sixth SET has been delayed.

Incidentally the examination was scheduled to have been held in August last year and had been postponed to January this year as the syllabus revision process by the UGC was yet to be completed. The UGC is in the process of preparing a model syllabus for subjects in which the National Eligibility Test NET and SET are conducted in order to bring about an uniformity in the curriculum. Teachers can appear for both NET and SET, but an additional advantage of appearing for NET is the possibility of obtaining a Junior Research Fellowship.

However so far the results of the SET examinations have been in the range of 6-7 pass percentage. The pass percentages of the first and second SET examination recorded a mere 5.64 and 6.18 while the third SET recorded a pass percentage of 5.38. Sources attributed the low pass percentages to the lack of students/lecturers appearing for the test.

Moreover with some subjects like mathematics recording a zero pass percentage, it had also become difficult to find qualified teachers. Now, thanks to the delay in the declaration of the results, it is unlikely that the next SET examination will be held in July this year.