Indore: The Grade+ accreditation by the National Assessment and Accreditation Council to Devi Ahilya Vishwavidyalaya (DAVV) has started showing its importance with 38 foreign students applying for admission to courses offered by its teaching departments. "In a first instance, such a large number of students from abroad applied for admission to DAVV which hasn't seen any foreigner enrolling for the past several years," said Professor VB Gupta. DAVV had got Grade A+ accreditation in January last year, but, apparently due to the Covid-19 scare, foreigners did not apply for admission to the only Grade+ accredited university of MP. With the number of Covid-19 cases going down in MP, foreign students have now started showing an interest in DAVV.

Applications routed through ICCR: Foreign nationals have to apply through the Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR) for admission to educational institutions in India. According to information, a total of 78 foreign nationals from different countries had applied online for admission to DAVV, but the applications of 40 students were cancelled as DAVV does not offer the courses they wanted to take admission to. Only applications of 38 students were approved. Foreign nationals have mostly shown an interest in taking admission to the post-graduate courses. Some students even want admission to Ph.D courses. Nine students have applied for admission to management courses, five to data science and the remaining to other courses.

Direct admission for foreign nationals: Most of the foreign students have applied from African and Asian countries-including Ghana, Nepal, Nigeria, Kenya, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka and South Africa. Students who have applied for admission to MBA courses did not mention if they want admission to any specialised course. DAVV runs only a core MBA course and admission to it is granted through the Directorate of Technical Education. However, there are around 18 other MBA courses to which admission is granted by DAVV through a Common Entrance Test. The application forms of these foreign nationals have been handed over to the CET committee members who are ringing up the applicants and informing them about the specialised MBA courses offered by DAVV. DAVV officials said that the students are being convinced to taking admission to the specialised MBA courses. CET committee member Gupta said the foreign nationals are given direct admission to DAVV. "They don't have to clear any entrance test," he added.