Commerce stream tops admissions even in online mode at Bangalore varsity

Bengaluru: Even in online courses, it is the Commerce stream which tops the admissions at Bangalore University (BU).

The BU is one among the three state-run varsities that have received permission from the University Grants Commission (UGC) to offer online undergraduate (UG) and postgraduate (PG) programmes.

After receiving the permission in the year 2021, the university started admissions from current academic year and 181 students enrolled for undergraduate commerce courses, which is highest among the 10 different courses offered.

As per the data available from the BU, the varsity is offering undergraduate courses only in commerce stream, while the rest are postgraduate courses.

“Considering the demand for undergraduate programme in commerce, we have decided to offer it online. This year, a total of 311 students got admitted to 10 different courses that we are offering,” said an official from the university.

However, the other postgraduate programmes in conventional subjects, like History, Political Science, Sociology and Economics, have witnessed single digit admissions. Even the demand for language subjects is less in online mode. For eg, four students have enrolled for Hindi MA and 14 for Kannada MA. English is better compared to these two subjects as it has received 27 admissions.

Prof B C Mylarappa, head of the Online Learning Department, said that there was a need to familiarise online education among public. “As this is the first year we are offering courses in online mode, the response is low. However, we will be expecting more admissions in the coming years,” he added.

Meanwhile, compared to the Distance Mode education which university used to offer earlier, the admissions to online mode were very less. As per the details available for the Distance mode, the university was admitting 2,000-plus students per year.

The state government has banned conventional universities from offering distance education by allowing only Karnataka State Open University (KSOU) Mysore to offer distance education.