The joint entrance examination, famously known as JEE, for admission to the IITs is likely to become history from 2013 as the central government has decided to work on a common entrance test for all government engineering colleges.
    Also, a strong hike is expected in tuition fees such that students will have to pay the difference money (what they have paid and what the IIT has spent on them) once they get a job.

    This decision is facing stiff opposition as students of various IITs have started protesting against the new proposed system of conducting exam. A petition concerning this has been made to the Govt. with over 2500 signatures : http://www.petitiononline.com/SaveJEE/petition.html

Being students of IIT Roorkee, what are your views regarding this proposed system of admission ?

I see no reason why the system would be bad. From what I know, the IITs are making the paper but CBSE is conducting the exam, which is fine by me. See, don't look at JEE as some ego rush for all of us. The primary aim of the exam is to get good people into the system and it need not be so exclusive. Not to make you famous. I don't think an exam is of much use anymore if it burns you out so much that you disregard studying altogether and are satisfied with it being your only academic achievement in four years. A slightly easier exam, maybe, as long as it gets people who are willing to put in some effort after they get into college too. Fine by me.

I have a slightly different take on this. Is IIT JEE infallible? Has it got no defects?
A critical examination of this question would elicit a very startling answer . The current examination is not fair (Personal View). Let me give an example to elucidate the matter. Take a student from a very deplorable village. He is the best boy in his village school, due to lack of good competition there he is not able to have an assement of his calibre to crack IIT JEE. His farmer father earning a meagrely 5000 per month is not able to buy books for him leave alone sending him to KOTA. The boy studies from the second hand text books and clears the board examination with much conviction but in current pattern that is immaterial as far as IIT is concerned. Now with the new pattern , the board examination will have much preference , also I believe the students across the entire spectrum of society will have a balanced chance of ending up in IIT. As far as the toughest examination in the world is concerned , what determines whether an examination is the toughest in the world? I guess the ratio of number of aspirants and number of vaccancy should be a good answer, more the ratio , tougher the exam, I guess that ratio will be preserved , and if not anything will increase thus making NAT the toughest exam in the world , keeping only IIT s in view.

As far as fees is concerned, IITs bear testimony to a rampant brain drain since the 80s. It is useless to waste public money on a human resource that will not pay dividend. Thus refurbishement of the wasted public money will mean the funds are preserved and replenished year after year for a more deserving candidate who will use his intellect for the betterment of the nation.

I for one am not signing that petition.

I feel that conducting a common entrance exam for all engg colleges is not at all bad. But I am strictly against  having a weightage of boards exams in selection procedure. we all know that one cannot rely on board marks as they not authentic. in science subjects we see that all the pvt schools' students get full marks in practicals while this is not the case in govt schools. also in boards like UP Board one easily pass/get more marks by paying 10-15k. we don't know how much effective will be the formula given by ISI. so a strict no for weightage of boards.
as far as increase in tution fees is concerned, it should be implemented.  those who are economically weak won't be affected as there are lots of scholarships available for them (like MCM in IITR).

@Sushobhan Sen I don't how you are planning to get good people into the system by making the exam simpler.A person who can clear the tough exam can surely clear the simpler one. You might still get the students who are unwilling to put effort after they go to college.
Students do not disregard studies because they cleared JEE. Most of the students who crack JEE went to a coaching where teachers created an interest for the subject. Each problem challenging your mind, motivating you towards JEE. Compare this with the boring lectures that take place here. These are the things due to which a student looses his interest. And those who are still able to listen these mundane lectures without any interest have good CGPAs.
There is a reason that IIT have such a fame in the world, why IITians are able to prove themselves where ever they stand and that's JEE(not being egoistic but it is the truth).

@Indradeep Banerjee You or your answer attempt to fix the problem without knowing the cause(Personal View).For better understanding read this article http://www.marco.org/2012/02/25/right-vs-pragmatic.
The main cause of that child from your story not clearing JEE is poor education level in village schools. Had the school education been good there wouldn't have been a need for coaching in the first place.
I am not proposing any solution to improve education in schools but I am saying that changing JEE is not the solution. If anything it would only worsen the effective situation. Let's say the village student was really smart and scored 95% in board exams. Don't you think KOTA coaching centers will change their teaching strategy. They will train students to mug up the perfect answers and spill it on the boards paper to secure 100%(which is much easier than clearing JEE). The village will still lose.

"more the ratio , tougher the exam". LOL... You really think this. You really think that NAT will be tougher than JEE whiech used to happen 7 years ago when doing one question itself is a big achievement. Let me give an example to make things clear. Suppose I am an HR manager of a company who came for recruiting students. I conduct a big exam which is open for all branches. Supposedly 500 students give the paper which was of addition, multiplication and divison without the calculator and I select only two students. The ratio is pretty tight isn't it. Would you call it a tough exam? I understand it was an impractical example but the next NAT is going to be this simple.

I hope these things make you cahnge your mind to sign that petition

No, I will not believe that the cause for success of an IITian is the fact that he cleared JEE. What you do in four/five years inside the IIT system is more likely a cause. The freedom and way of life here is the cause, not JEE. Such a high premium to one exam in Class 12 lacks logic.
What I am saying is that a simpler exam will make it a little easier to get into the IITs, but it will see that students are not burned out by then. The sad thing is that JEE has become an end in itself and coaching centres are responsible for this. Just clearing JEE seems to become the sole aim of anyone who wants to come to IIT, not actually gaining engineering  knowledge. After all, JEE is basically a 12th class science exam and 12th class science does not make you a competent engineer.
I think Minister Sibal, for all his dumb remarks, still has a point when he says that coaching centres are a bane. There will be no pressure on the education system to improve as long as a parallel coaching industry is ruling the roost - rather, the pressure on state governments from these lobbies is to keep the system the way it is. With board exams finally carrying some weight, the focus of Class 12 will go back to actually learning for the sake of learning and not clearing one exam.

well, in my view I think that this step does have a broader negetive look than the positive side. Now when we talk about IIT, we all are well aware of the prestige this instituion owns in the international market. Playing with the entrance exam of such an institution is not a general issue. It can, and it will definitely, change the future of many children in coming years.
First let us have a look on what "JEE" used to test in a student. Lets take an example of any general physics question, what AIEEE and CBSE boards emphasize is does the student remembers the formulae by heart and knows their application and what JEE would ask is in the part where those 'formulae' fails and cannot be applied.
Now emphasizing on what govt. must have considered for taking such an insane step, firstly one of the issue was cutting down the total fee spent for buying forms of various different exams.....so I would here like to highlight that any student appearing such exams are well aware of the institutions importance and that these would decide his future. Moreover cutting short the 3 chances which earlier a student had to a single day chance that will decide his future is not at all fair to him. Most of the student in pressure do not perform good in one exam happens to excel with good ranks in another exam.
Secondly, such a system will degrade the dignity of IIT it has earned over years. It will significantly change the crowd that enters the institute and will lead to many deserving candidates attaining from what was supposed to be theirs.
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R.I.P JEE

actually the common exam system is good but it will add on a lot of pressur on the children..

STATUS QUO:- An exam wherein on the D-day one has to showcase all his mettle sitting on a chair. Which in more than many ways tries to test his/her mettle. Also takes into account the amount of hard work he/she has put into it. Also ensures people with right aptitude walk into IITs. YES in some cases we do need to pay to coaching classes but the thing is even there talent is rewarded in many ways ( we all have seen FTRE and other exams, wherein people get reimbursements and scholarships). Coaching institutes promise better and dedicated teachers, regular and No-nonsense classes also a better structured system vis-a-vis schools.

NEW SYSTEM:- A LOT depends on my schools some really big shot schools make it a point of ensuring their students get good practical scores while some schools can't even afford a laboratory. The child in the village is now totally at the mercy of his teachers, what sessionals will they give to him, how will they adjudge his performance here and most important WHAT BOARD IS HE IN. while someone at some random international school has best teachers, best facilities and tehy will decide the best subject collection for him while someone in that village won't even have an idea of what subjects are actually provided by the board to appear into( I really doubt someone in a village would know of IP or French as subjects and hence would be able to gauge how scoring they are).

HOW WE PREPARE FOR BOARDS:- I personally sat down on a couch, took my NCERT textbook and ghissed it down to the keel. I mugged everything up because that's what the teachers told me to do( It kinda worked with 97% and 96% in 10th and 12th). The very first time I tried to understand why rays from infinty converge on the focus of a lens was when my correspondence module explained it to me.

IITR ADMINS decide what do you want . I personally am ready to become anyone of the above cases