Simultala Awasiya Vidyalaya in Jamui. Telegraph picture

Patna, Jan. 19: Students who want to study at Simultala residential school in Jamui will have to take their entrance test at Chankaya National Law University, Patna, this year.

Sources said the state education department has given the law cradle the duty of conducting the examination after the school management informed the government that they did not have the manpower to carry out the exercise.

Rajeev Ranjan, principal, Simultala Awasiya Vidyalaya, told The Telegraph: “At a meeting with the education department in December, we informed the officials that we did not have the manpower to conduct the examination.”

The preliminary round of the entrance examination is scheduled for April, followed by the mains in June. The educational institute will admit 120 students in Class VI, equal number of boys and girls.

In 2010 — the year the education institute opened its doors — 32,000 aspirants had taken the preliminary test. Last year, the number came down to 22,000.

Ranjan attributed the fall in the number to the change in the agency conducting the examination. In the first year, the state human resource development (now education) department had published advertisements in major newspapers for the test. “But in the second year, the school conducted the exam and less people got to know about it,” he said. The reduced number is also too much for the school to handle. Sources said the school lacks teachers in subjects like English, chemistry, history and Sanskrit.

Asked why the school — a dream project of chief minister Nitish Kumar, conceptualised on the lines of Netarhat Vidyalaya, Jharkhand — did not have adequate faculty, K.K. Sinha, director of secondary education, said: “We want the best for Simultala school. Advertisements for the vacant posts were published last month. Suitable candidates will be selected soon.”

The law hub, on the other hand, is all set to conduct the exam. They have formed an 11-member committee for the purpose. CNLU registrar S.P. Singh told The Telegraph: “The task assigned to us by the education department is very important.”