Mumbai University results: Over a lakh students still await marks as institute fails to declare new date

Mumbai: More than one lakh Mumbai University (MU) students are yet to find out what their exam results are. And it looks like the students still have a bit of a wait left, as MU is still unclear about the declaration date. [caption id=“attachment_3946939” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Worried students at Mumbai University. Sanjay Sawant/Firstpost[/caption] Results are usually declared in the last week of June or in the first week of July. But this year, a large number of students, especially in Commerce, Taxation and Law courses, are in the dark. What’s making matters worse is a lack of clarity regarding information, with the varsity neither giving out reasons for the delay nor mentioning dates on which they are likely to be announced. Out of a total of 4.77 lakh students, only 3.31 lakh results had been announced till 14 August, meaning 1.46 lakh students are still clueless about their results. Till 18 August, out of 477 exams results of only 354 have been declared with 123 remaining. This has also stymied the efforts of students who have applied for admission to colleges abroad. Talking to Firstpost, Prakash Kadam, a parent who had recently visited MU along with his son to find out the latter’s results, is in a spot. “Nobody is taking any responsibility. We have visited the university several times and every single time, the clerk we met had no answer about when we would receive the results. It’s a total mess,” said Kadam. A student, Satyavijay Joshi, said, “There are no systems in place there. We have to keep going from official to official for information. The university should have set up the help desk much earlier.” The acting MU Vice-Chancellor Devanand Shinde, who took over authority after Sanjay Deshmukh was sent on leave on 9 August by Maharashtra Governor and Chancellor C Vidyasagar Rao, said, “My aim is to declare the results at the earliest.” He also added that there were some “technical glitches” affecting the online assessments. Additionally, following this delay, the governor sent a showcause notice to the then vice-chancellor of the varsity, Deshmukh, demanding reasons for the delay. Samir Dubey, a third-year student from Andheri mentioned to Firstpost that the lakhs of students are visiting the MU website for information on the results because of which the website has also slowed down. Rao did, in fact, call a meeting at Raj Bhavan to look into the whole results delay issue. Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, Education Minister Vinod Tawde, Devanand Shinde and other senior officials had attended this meeting. Deshmukh’s response to Rao’s showcause notice, in which he had alleged sabotage and technical glitches for the delays, didn’t cut much ice with the governor. It remains to be seen what action Rao takes ultimately. In 160 years of the Mumbai University’s existence, this is the first time a vice-chancellor has been issued a showcause notice for delays in the announcement of exam results.