New Delhi: In news which will gladden DU admission seekers, the varsity is mulling an increase of around 2,000 undergraduate seats in its various courses. It is likely, however, that the hike in seats will be introduced from the next academic session and not the upcoming one, admissions for which are set to begin this week.

"There are certain popular courses like Bachelor of Business Studies (BBS) and sociology which are offered at fewer colleges. The panel today approved their introduction in more number of colleges," said Prof Nachiketa Singh, part of the 14-member Standing Committee on Selection of Courses set up last week by DU Vice Chancellor Dinesh Singh.
 
He added, however, that it is likely the increase will be made effective from the next academic session and not for the 2015-16 one, admissions for which begin on May 28.

"After the standing committee approval, the courses need to be approved by the varsity's Academic Council (AC) and Executive Council (EC), the statutory bodies. "Since there is no time left for getting the proposal approved by these councils ahead of the 2015-16 session, it is likely that they would be offered from the next one," Nachiketa said.

"But the possibility of introducing them from this session is still being worked out. The step will contribute to an increase of around 2,000 seats," he added.

Another proposal passed today by the committee was for the introduction of a course in Forensic Science. "In a first, DU will be offering B.Sc in Forensic Science, initially at Khalsa College," he said.

While the BBS course will also be offered by SGTB Khalsa College, Ramanujan College and Guru Gobind Singh College of Commerce, the sociology course will be offered by Bharti College.

Among the other courses in which the varsity is mulling an increase in intake are history, physics and geography. Nachiketa, meanwhile, added that although the student intake will increase, that would not affect the recruitment of teaching staff.

"Right now, the proposal is for only increasing the number of courses and student intake; the faculty arrangement will remain the same as the varsity doesn't plan to make any changes in the workload calculation," he said. "The increase in seats will be in humanities, commerce and science courses as per the need and popularity. There is another committee meeting scheduled next week to decide on that," Nachiketa said.

DU presently has around 54,000 UG seats in around 70 colleges. The online registration process for admissions to the 2015-16 academic session will be open from May 28 to June 15 while offline forms will be accepted at the registration centres from June 5 to June 15. The first cut-off list will be announced on June 25.