Continuing its tradition of goof-ups during exam season, the Mumbai University (MU) has once again blundered ahead of the fifth semester exam, triggering panic among nearly 80,000 third year B Com students. The duration of all seven exam papers mentioned in the hall ticket differs from the ones told to the students before the beginning of the academic year.#What's the error?The hall ticket says that all papers are of two hours, while colleges and students contend that the time limit should be 2.30 hours as stated in the university notification issued earlier. The exams are slated to be held between November 7 and November 24.Panic-stricken students are now doing rounds of their respective colleges and the university's Kalina campus for clarification. They said varsity officials were clueless about the matter, and slammed them for being 'most callous' at this crucial time.#When did the new timing come into effect?The university has revised the assessment pattern from this academic year, changing the theory and practical marks ratio from 60:40 to 75:25. The question papers were of two hours in the 60:40 system, which was to go up by half an hour from this semester.#What do students, colleges say?"The callous Exam House seems to have forgotten to make the change in the system," said a college principal requesting anonymity.A senior Exam House official admitted, "We are reissuing the hall tickets with the amendment. Within next two days, everyone will get the correct hall tickets." However, colleges said this will increase their administrative burden."We would need to print, sign and issue the hall tickets all over again, which is not only the waste of human resources but also of paper. This also puts a question mark on the varsity's green efforts," said a principal.#Has MU goofed up for first time?Not at all. Since it decided to go digital with online exam forms and hall tickets by roping in an IT firm three years ago, students have been subjected to various gaffes, including wrong names of students, subjects, exam centres. After drawing much flak, the varsity has decided to end the contract with the firm "very soon" if it fails to improve the performance (dna had reported on this last month).#What has been varsity's response?Controller of Examiner Dinesh Bonde chose to downplay the issue, terming it 'minor'. "The error crept in because the supplementary exam of the TYBCom (old batch) is having two-hour papers." He also claimed that mistake was rectified within half an hour of uploading the hall tickets and very few colleges might have downloaded the documents in that short span.Bonde added, "Anyway, we have made correction in the timetable which is now uploaded on our website. A fresh circular in this regard will be issued on Monday to clear all confusion."

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