Less than a month after launching its Facebook (FB) page, the Delhi University (DU) seems to have lost the enthusiasm for the social networking media. Both the university's website and the FB page have updates on just the first and second cut-off lists. As a result, many candidates seeking admission under the sports quota did not get to know that Friday was the first and in many cases the only day for trials.

Five percent seats for every course in every college are reserved for sports and extra-curricular activities (ECA) quota. After witnessing high cut-offs with most colleges closing down their courses in the first list itself, several students have banked on their non-academic talents to get in through the sports and ECA quota.

Sports quota reserves seats for those proficient in shooting, judo, athletics, swimming, basketball, tennis, archery, table tennis, badminton, cricket, kho-kho etc. Indraprastha (IP), Miranda House and Daulat Ram (DR) colleges had their trials for the sports quota on Friday.

Ragini from Varanasi who wants to take up Political Science (Hons) in IP said, "I missed my swimming trials because we don’t have a computer at home and my brother’s phone has internet which he used for surfing Facebook to check what the university is putting up, but it didn't have any information on sports trials. I haven’t even applied anywhere else."

Sheila Dayal, a student from Bukaro who has won gold medals in basketball said, “I want to do BA from DR but I almost missed my trials today. There was no intimation about it on the website. Luckily my brother checked DR’s website to get the timings for the sports. Only one day is allotted per sport, I would have missed my chance of making it to the college.”

Dayal adds, “I had attended the open day with my mother in which the VC had said, he will personally try to answer every query on the FB page, but he did not, nor did anyone else in his absence. I had put up this question thrice, asking when the sports trials in north campus colleges will commence, but it did not receive any reply.”

J M Khurana, dean, students welfare on the launch of the FB page said, "We want to make things simple and convenient for outstation students by providing them with all the information online."

However, he was unavailable for comment on sports trials list not being updated on DU's website and the FB page.

Dinesh Singh, the vice chancellor (VC) of Delhi University launched the official FB page of DU on May 30. This was done around two weeks after the CBSE results were out and around two weeks before the first cut off list for the undergraduate courses was announced.

On the launch, the VC said, “Facebook page, 'DU for You' will be updated minute by minute with all the details of the admissions this year. So will the official DU website, du.ac.in. All the important dates and documents which need to be kept in mind for students before and during the admissions will be put up.”

Even those who turned up for the sports trials on Friday found it tough going as the colleges did not seem prepared or even bothered to host the candidates properly.

Daulat Ram had athletics, javelin, short-put trials at 8 am and cricket, base ball and soft ball trials at 2 pm. The college saw only a few students turning up for these sports, but it still couldn't handle the small group.

There was no proper seating arrangement for the students and their parents and no clean toilets for the girls to use. The faculty wasted over an hour just to verify certificates and interview four girls in the slot.

Jyoti, a champion in cricket who wants a seat in English (Hons) in DR said, "We are coming here after having given trials in IP. We are up since 6 am without having eaten a morsel just to be fit enough for the running around needed. These guys are taking more than 15 minutes just to verify our certificates. Why can't they have separate faculty to verify and separate to take our trials. It is painful to wait in this sun."

Neha, another student who wants to take up English said, "There is no proper ground for us to play cricket, no gloves for baseball, our coach is trained for softball, when we have specialised certificates in each sport, our coach should also be specialised."

Kavita Sharma, in-charge of looking into sports trials at DR said,"We are doing our best with the limited resources we have. The Commonwealth Games committee was to provide us their grounds and equipment but no formal bond is signed as yet. We hope for something to materialise soon."

With the sports trials for this year's students ending next week, the college surely needs more than hope to get things right within six days.