New Delhi, Sept. 15: The human resource development ministry will not change its stand on reforms in the joint entrance examination to IITs, though aspirants to these premier technical institutes have hit the streets in protest.

“We do not have any plan to review the decision,” said a senior HRD ministry official.

The joint advisory board of IIT directors and HRD officials will meet in Calcutta on Saturday to work out the details of the new system.

IIT aspirants continued to agitate against the Centre’s decision which makes it mandatory for them to get at least 60 per cent marks in their 12th board examination.

The current admission system does not prescribe any qualifying marks for students appearing for the exam, known as JEE. Students can now get admission if they pass the two levels of tests ? first a screening and then the main examination. They can get admission even if the school-leaving board exam score is 40 per cent.

Students gathered outside Delhi IIT and demanded that the new examination structure should be enforced from 2007, not the next academic year. The protest prompted a mild lathi-charge by police.

Student bodies joined the stir, which entered its third day, to persuade the Centre to reconsider its decision.

In Patna, hundreds of activists of the ABVP and other student bodies staged demonstrations, disrupting traffic for a couple of hours. Protestors burnt effigies of Union HRD minister Arjun Singh.

IIT aspirants who have enrolled in coaching centres in Varanasi staged a sit-in near Banaras Hindu University and shouted slogans against the Centre’s proposal.

However, the government is not relenting. Officials said Singh is keen on pushing through the reforms as soon as possible.

“Who is protesting ? students or coaching institutions? It seems the coaching institutions are shouting themselves hoarse,” said a ministry official.