SHILLONG, March 21: Clearing the air over the confusion with regard to the Common University Entrance Test or CUET, Chief Minister Conrad K. Sangma on Tuesday said that colleges affiliated to NEHU are exempted from CUET but there is no exemption for courses offered by the University.
He harped on the need to affiliate all the colleges in the state to Meghalaya’s first state-run Captain Williamson Sangma University by the end of this fall in order to achieve a permanent solution.
“The process for CUET exemption has already started for Meghalaya. We got exemption last year and we will get an exemption this year also because I have spoken to the Minister of Education and he has assured exemption for colleges that are affiliated to NEHU but not for NEHU courses,” the CM told the House.
“So anybody applying for NEHU courses will have to appear the CUET. In our state we did not have a state university and colleges had no option but to affiliate to NEHU by default. So even though you are from Nongtalang College and have no intention to apply to NEHU you have to go for CUET just because Nongtalang College is affiliated to NEHU which is very inconvenient and actually not practical.”
According to the CM, the government will introduce a bill for the Captain Williamson Sangma Technical University and take it up for discussion in the House.
“When it becomes an Act we are going to convert the university into a full-fledged one which means that any college can affiliate to it and not to NEHU. Once the affiliation is done, students of the college do not have to apply for CUET,” he added.