By Nitin Viijay
The JEE Advanced 2023 result is already out, and the Joint Seat Allocation Authority (JoSAA) has successfully completed two rounds of the JoSAA Counselling process which began in June. The third round of JEE Advanced Counselling 2023 will begin on July 12 and candidates will get time to report online till July 14. However, there are a lot of doubts surrounding the students where they need guidance to go through the entire process smoothly. Given that a lot of stages are involved in the counselling, it is quite possible that the candidate might get stuck at some point. In order to help them understand the process better, let’s go through the JoSAA counselling in detail to make an informed decision at the time of college selection.
Institutes under JoSAA Counselling
A total of 118 institutes come under JoSAA Counselling. Candidates are eligible to apply for 23 IITs, 31 NITs, IIEST Shibpur, 26 IIITs, and 38 other GFTIs (Government Funded Technical Institutes.) Here, only those candidates can apply for IIT who have given JEE Advanced and have qualified the exam. On the other hand, candidates qualifying the JEE Main exam are eligible for NITs, IIEST Shibpur, IIITs, and GFTIs.
Number of Rounds
The counseling consists of six rounds. In addition to this, there is also a special CSAB counseling round. Candidates need to fill for the CSAB round separately.
The sixth round is very crucial. There is hardly any difference in the closing ranks of the first five rounds. But there is a massive leap in the 6th round with the chances of getting better seat allotment.
CSAB Round – This round is conducted to fill the vacant seats left after the six rounds. It has been seen that a college that closes in 5000 rank in the normal counselling goes upto to 75000 rank in the CSAB round.
Processes involved in counseling
- Registration
- Choice filling
- Mock seat allotment
- Locking of choices
- Seat allotment Result
- Print allotment letter
- Freeze/ float/ slide
- Documents verification
- Seat acceptance fees
Choice Filling: At the time of filling the choice, candidates must do proper research and look at the closing rank of the colleges of the previous year. Though one can fill multiple choices, it is important to select the colleges depending on the rank. For instance, for a 15,000 rank one should choose colleges admitting students with 10000 to 20000 ranks. It is advisable that candidates select colleges within the range of 5000 based on the previous year’s data.
Locking of choice: In this stage there are three options.
- Freeze – When candidates are satisfied with the college and course allotted to them then they can opt for the freeze option to lock the seat of their choice.
- Float – In case, the student wants to keep the allotted college but is hoping to get better options in the next round, then he/she can go ahead with the float option to sit for the next round as well while not losing out on the current seat.
- Slide – One can choose this option to upgrade their branch. For those seeking the same college but intend to change their branch can go for the slide option.
Mock seat allotment: The mock seat allotment gives the students an overview of what colleges they might get based on the previous data. Depending on that students can get a better idea of the colleges that is more appropriate for their rank. Hence, one can go back to the choice-filling stage and make changes in the order of colleges.
Hence, after selecting the option as per their preference, it is advisable to select “I will lock my choice later’ as failing to do so they won’t be able to change their choice later in case they are not satisfied with the MOCK seat allotment.
Having talked about the important stages where students get stuck during the counseling process, there is one more factor that confuses them the most. Students are always faced with the dilemma when deciding between the course and college. At such times, students should always go for the course of their interest that will make the engineering years enjoyable and pave the path for a lucrative career as well.
The author is founder, CEO, Motion Education Pvt. Ltd.