For day 1 of college, Delhi University rolls out the red carpet

On Wednesday, orientations and freshers’ programmes returned to Delhi University’s campuses after more than two years with the start of the academic year for the newly admitted first-year students.

“Our journey to be here has been a roller coaster ride,” said Anamika, who was excited to begin at Miranda House in its BA (Hons) English programme. “At the end of it, I’m happy to be in one of the best colleges,” she added.

She recounted all the ‘firsts’ that this batch of students has been part of: the introduction of ‘Basic Maths’ for their CBSE class XII exams, two board examinations in class XII, CUET for DU admissions coupled with multiple postponements and cancellations. Since the start of the pandemic, they are the first batch of DU students who are beginning their first year on campus.

Now that she is here, Anamika said she is keen to explore the different college societies. “We were told a little about the different societies on our first day. I will explore more in the days to come but I’ve always liked public speaking, so I’m interested in the debating society,” she said.

The long admission process had unnerved her new classmate Shreya Chauhan, which led her to take up a seat in another college as a back-up option. “I had taken a seat in a government college in my city Ajmer. As far as I know, it doesn’t even have regular classes but this was just as an assurance that I had a seat in place while this process carried on,” she said.

While Prashant Jha from Noida said he “almost felt like giving up” through the course of the process, his wait may have paid off for him. With a 90% in his CBSE board examinations, it would have been very unlikely to be admitted in BCom (Hons) at Shri Ram College of Commerce through those marks. But he performed well in CUET and secured that coveted seat.

The tightly packed admission schedule means that many students from outside Delhi are still trying to find their way around finding accommodation. For now, Aditi Garg, who has been admitted to BA (Hons) Economics in Ramjas College, will travel up and down every day from her home in Uttar Pradesh’s Muzaffarnagar until she can finalise a place to stay in Delhi. Her admission process had only been completed a week back and the college has not released its hostel forms yet. Rohan, who has been admitted to BA (Hons) Economics at Delhi College of Arts and Commerce, is from Jalandhar, Punjab. After looking around for a couple of days, he finally found accommodation in Malviya Nagar, which is about 8 km away.

Most students would not have gotten their first preference college-course combinations. Muskan, who is all set to pursue BA (Hons) English at Sri Venkateswara College, is one of them but she said she was delighted by her first day: “Even though this wasn’t my first preference, I’m very happy to be here. The crowd, campus, faculty, everything is great and I’m looking forward to a great college life.”