The third cut-off list was announced on Friday night in a majority of colleges with a slight dip as compared to the second cut-off.

Click on the links below for THIRD Cut off marks

Arts and Commerce cut off
Science cut off

Colleges like Sri Venkateswara, Hindu and Hansraj have come out with a third list for the popular B.Com (Hons) course. Sri Venkateswara College has slashed its cut-off for B.Com (H) from 93.25 to 92.75 percent. The B.Com Programme is available in colleges including SGGS College of Commerce, SGTB Khalsa College and Kirori Mal College.

English (Hons) is also available in some good colleges. While Lady Sri Ram (LSR) College has lowered its cut-off to 88.25 percent, Hindu has slashed its cut-off for the English (Hons) programme by 3 percent at 85 percent.

Indrapastha College has closed all admissions except for its BA Programme and Sanskrit. Quite expectedly, SRCC hasn't figured in the third list.

In Humanities Courses, Political Science (Hons) can still be pursued at Gargi College (70-81 pc) and Delhi College of Arts & Commerce (68-81 pc).

In Science Courses, the drop in the cut-off is between 3 pc to 8 pc in some colleges. Admission are open at Miranda House to Physics (76.66 pc), Chemistry (73.66 pc), Botany (72 pc) and Zoology (79.33 pc).

At Hansraj College, admission to most of the Science Courses has been closed.

R.C. Shrivastav, Director (Human Resource), says NTPC has been following a comprehensive approach towards the retention of talent in the company as part of its people management practices. "Over the years, we have created a robust system for induction of talent, socialisation into company culture, regular motivation, and development. Certainly, NTPC, being a public sector company, cannot match the high salary and compensation being offered by some private sector companies for their experienced employees. However, NTPC as an employer has a number of things to offer, including an excellent social security package, learning and development opportunities, career growth, enabling work culture, excellent quality of work and social life ? in our townships. All these benefits and measures have been playing a major role in enhancing employee commitment and retention," he says.

As far as induction of fresh talent is concerned, the company relies on campus recruitment and open advertisement modes. Approximately, the company recruits between 500 and 650 professional graduates every year. "NTPC offers compensation and a benefit structure, especially at the entry level for fresh graduates, which are comparable to leading private sector companies in the power sector. Besides, we offer an exciting work environment, challenging assignments and learning opportunities, performance-linked economic incentives, and so on. As is evident from a number of surveys, working with NTPC is a great experience. Overall, the company has a good brand value in the market as an employer, which attracts young professionals to be part of the NTPC family," he says.

On the plans of the company in terms of training and attracting specialised talent in view of its entering new areas like nuclear power generation, Shrivastav says, "We are following a two-fold approach for meeting talent requirement for our new areas such as hydropower generation, coal mining, electricity distribution and trading. Firstly, we recruit experienced people from outside at the lateral level by offering additional compensation. Exclusive and customised compensation and benefit packages have also been designed for relatively difficult areas of posting. Secondly, we are trying to build capability in our employees for new businesses through training and development."

The MBA fair will be held at the Hyatt Regency (Ring Road) in New Delhi tomorrow between 2 pm and 6 pm.

More than 30 B-Schools from across the globe including Toronto -Rotman, IE Business School, Bond, Cornell-Nanyang, Ashridge Business School, Hult, U21 Global, Durham and ESMT will participate in the MBA fair.

The interactive educational software called 'Abracadabra' is designed to help struggling school students aged five to eight years learn basic literacy skills to equip them for the future.

The tool has just undergone a 10-week trial that has been described as a success.

The ITES sector has matured considerably with its expansion into varied verticals, well differentiated service offerings and increasing geographic penetration. India's importance among emerging economies, both as a supply and demand centre is fuelling further growth of the sector. The IT / ITES industry continues to be one of the fastest growing industries in India, while India maintains its position as a strategic off-shoring destination for MNCs worldwide.

The ITES-BPO employee base has grown to 553,000 in FY (financial year) 07 from 415,000 in FY 06. Over the past decade, the Indian BPO segment has witnessed significant transformation. Starting with basic data entry tasks, the industry graduated to a high proportion of voice-based services and a range of back-office processing activities. The last 3-4 years have seen the scope of services expanding to include increasingly complex processes involving rule-based decision making and even research services requiring informed individual judgment.
The rapid expansion in the scope of BPO has been accompanied by an equally rapid adoption across a range of vertical industries. This wide range of services may be summarised into four broad categories comprising customer interaction services (CIS), finance and accounting (F&A), human resource administration and niche business services.

Key highlights of domestic BPO industry:
BPO demand in the domestic market has witnessed noticeable growth over the past few years. The annual revenue aggregate of the domestic market for ITES-BPO grew to USD 1.2 billion in FY 2006-07 from USD 0.9 billion in FY 2005-06, illustrating a significant increase in demand. While the high growth rate may be attributed to a small-base effect, the rapid adoption of BPO in the domestic market is receiving well-deserved attention.

The Indian economy is increasingly being integrated globally, businesses in India are beginning to face increasing levels of global competition and being pushed to deliver world class levels of product and service quality. ITES-BPO has emerged as an effective means of entrusting specialists with the task of consistently delivering the desired high-levels of quality - leaving the client organisations to focus on their core businesses.

Key growth drivers of Indian ITES-BPO exports:
Abundant talent- India's young demographic profile is an inherent advantage complemented by an academic infrastructure that generates a large pool of English speaking talent. Talent suitability concerns are being addressed through a combination of government, academia and industry led initiatives. These initiatives include national roll out of skill, setting up finishing schools to supplement graduate education with training in specific technology areas and soft skills and memorandums of understanding (MoUs) with education agencies to facilitate industry inputs on curriculum and teaching and develop faculty development programme.

The project will come up at a cost of an estimated Rs 250 crore. Official sources said the government proposes to set up the institute at Garnavadi village in the chief minister's native district, Rohtak. The institute will have a sprawling campus spread over 165 acres along NH-10. State chief secretary Dharambir told TOI that the state government has already sent a proposal to the Centre, saying it will provide land free of cost for the institute. ``Rohtak is the perfect venue for such an institute. With the completion of six laning of the Delhi-Rohtak stretch of NH-10, this region will get high-speed connectivity to the capital,'' he added.

``Since Haryana has posted major growth in all other fields and the Congress government has managed to hold on to its support base, there's no reason why the Centre would not clear this project,'' said a government source.

Officials admitted that though the state has scripted its success story in terms of economic growth, it has been lagging behind in the field of higher education. ``Until we create enough skilled manpower to fuel that industrial and economic development, we won't be able to maintain this rate of growth,'' said an official. The government has already announced this year as the ``Year of Education''.

KSOU presently has six regional centers in and around Karnataka.

The opening of the regional centre at Pitam Pura area will benefit all those students, pursuing or eager to take up courses at the university through distance education.

One of the main conveniences for students will be that the centre will bridge the distance problems faced by students for various enquiries and taking up exams. They will no more need to travel to Karnataka for the university related matters.

It will also help many students in case of job transfer and other reason to this part of India.

According to Karnataka State Open University's Vice Chancellor Professor B.A. Viveka Rai, the university hopes the number of students admitted to the KSOU will rise this year.

The M.Tech-Ph.D course in astronomical instrumentation is the first full-fledged programme the university is launching in association with a central institution.

The degree will be awarded by both institutions.

The course will be taught in CU, while teachers from the Bangalore institute will come at regular intervals to deliver lectures. The students will also visit Bangalore to avail themselves of the facilities there.

The university’s faculty council on Wednesday unanimously approved the proposal to introduce the course. The council’s decision will be placed before the syndicate, CU’s highest decision-making body, for approval.

“Students will benefit in a big way from this tie-up with a renowned institution like the Indian Institute of Astrophysics,” said CU vice-chancellor Suranjan Das.

The university has signed a memorandum of understanding with the institute.

Officials said the university has chosen astronomical instrumentation for the tie-up as job opportunities in the field are increasing.

The university is also planning to tie up with other “renowned institutions” in the country for launching similar integrated courses.

The syllabus and the rules and regulations of the astronomical instrumentation course will soon be framed by both institutions. Students willing to enrol for the programme will have to clear an all-India test.