Students outside a JEE exam centre in Bhubaneswar on Saturday.

Around 50,000 students from Odisha have appeared for the JEE (Mains) examination, conducted at 76 centres across the state. Bhubaneswar housed as many as 21 centres and the exam was conducted at 10 centres each in Cuttack, Berhampur and Balasore.

Centres were also set up in Sambalpur, Rourkela, Angul, Jeypore and Bhawanipatna. The examination began at 9.30am and concluded at 12.30pm.

The Paper-I result would be announced on April 27.

"I have done well. The sample papers were available on the Internet, and I had an over all idea about the questions. I hope to get a good rank," said Prachi, who took the exam.

"The exam went well and the questions were easy. I would love to join NIT, Rourkela, since it is closer to my home," said another candidate, Rishav.

The JEE (Mains) online examination would be held on April 10 and 11.

The JEE (Advanced) would be conducted on May 24. Registrations for JEE (Advanced) will start on May 2, and the admit cards can be downloaded online from May 9.

The results would be announced on June 18, after which the process of counselling for admission into IITs, NITs and other central institutes would begin.

Odisha joined the JEE (Mains) bandwagon last year. Besides Odisha, the states of Gujarat, Maharashtra, Nagaland, Madhya Pradesh, Haryana, Punjab and Uttarakhand have also joined the JEE (Mains) system.

This year, apart from the JEE (Mains), the state government will also be admitting students through the state-level Odisha JEE that would be held on July 24 and the results of which would be declared on July 27.

Text by Priya Abraham

Picture by Sanjib Mukherjee