JEE-Mains to be held four times a year starting 2021

From 2021, the Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) Mains will be held four times a year. This will not only give aspirants a chance for bettering their scores, but also help those students who miss the exam for any reason, a chance of not letting the year go waste. And for the first time ever, the exam will be held simultaneously in 13 Indian languages: English, Hindi, Assamese, Bangla, Gujarati, Marathi, Kannada, Odia, Punjabi, Malayalam ,Telugu, Tamil and Urdu.

Union education minister Ramesh Pokhriyal made the announcement on Wednesday. He had, a few days ago, held a virtual interactive session with students and many had suggested that instead of one exam a year, if the paper is conducted with higher frequency, they get a chance of not wasting the year. The minister had said he would look into the suggestions and come up with a decision soon.

The first installment of JEE-Mains will be held from February 23 to 26. The paper will then be held again in March, April and May. Those dates will be announced subsequently. 

The minister said the aspirants could attempt all the four times, or whichever they chose. Their best scores would be considered. He added that since the boards had slashed syllabi this year because of the pandemic disruptions, the students would have to answer only 75 of the 90 questions, so that they had more options.

During the interactive session, the students had said that travel to exam centres was becoming a problem because of the pandemic and they feared having to lose a year.