New Delhi, Aug. 24: The IITs will raise subject cutoffs using a new selection formula in an admission that the current one is flawed, and have promised to make the new formula public soon.

The institutes have also decided to relax the admission criteria for Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe students next year to minimise waste of seats.

But the premier engineering schools have postponed the decisions on whether to bar Kota as a centre for the IIT joint entrance examination (JEE) and on raising the minimum marks aspirants must score in their board exams.

The joint admission board of the IITs — the highest policy-making body for the JEE — met in Kharagpur today and decided to modify the admission criteria, IIT sources said.

“In 2009, subject cutoffs will be fixed using a different formula from the one used in 2007 and 2008. This formula will be finalised and made available on the JEE website soon,” an IIT director said.

The Telegraph had last year reported that the 2006 cutoffs, when calculated using the formula the IITs claimed to have used, were different from the actual cutoffs the IITs said they had used. As many as 994 general category students who had cleared the cutoffs obtained using the IITs’ stated formula were denied seats.

In 2007 and 2008, the IITs followed a different formula from the one they claimed to have used in 2006.

The top 80 per cent students in each subject — physics, chemistry and mathematics — were short-listed in 2007 and 2008. A revised list of students common to all three subject lists — the top 80 per cent for all three subjects — was then created, and the aggregate of these students calculated. Based on the number of seats available, students with the top aggregates were selected to the IITs.

“The major change likely… in 2009 is that the cutoffs are going to rise,” a senior IIT official said.

The IITs today also decided to relax the selection criteria for SC/ST students. Their cutoffs are now fixed at 60 per cent of the marks obtained by the lowest ranked successful general category student.

In 2009, the SC/ST cutoff in each subject and for the aggregate will be kept at 50 per cent the cutoff for general category students, officials said.

They accepted that the increase in subject cutoffs for general category students will cause a corresponding hike for SC/ST candidates, but claimed it would not offset the effects of the relaxation.

“Although the subject cutoffs may rise under the new formula, the aggregate cutoff is not likely to change much. Relaxing the aggregate cutoff for SC/ST students is critical, as that is the stage at which they fail,” an official said.

The IITs have this year increased SC/ST seats by a little over 4 per cent to ensure their share remains 22.5 per cent of the total following the implementation of 9 per cent OBC quotas. But in 2009, the IITs plan to increase the OBC quota to 18 per cent — they have to implement 27 per cent reservations in three years — and need to alter the number of seats for SC/ST students accordingly.

The arithmetic translates into the IITs doubling the SC/ST seats introduced this year, to arrive at an 8 per cent increase with 2007 — pre-OBC quota — as the base.

The move to relax the SC/ST cutoffs is aimed at filling the increased seats in 2009.

Officials said the joint implementation committee, a body that implements the JEE, would take a decision on whether to bar Kota from hosting the entrance test next year.

The sources hinted that there were minor differences of opinion among the IIT directors on Kota’s future as a JEE centre. The committee is likely to meet later this year.

A proposal to raise the eligibility cutoff from 60 per cent to 70 per cent in the Class XII board exams has found favour with the human resource development ministry, sources said.

The proposal, made by IIT Madras director M.S. Ananth to his colleagues, is now under the ministry’s consideration since it involves consultations with school boards.