By: Rinku R.
When the Common University Entrance Test (CUET) was rolled out, it was presented as a long-overdue correction to an inequitable admissions system. Board marks, we were told, were unreliable. Cut-offs had become absurd. A single, standardised test would finally level the playing field. A few admission cycles later, CUET has undoubtedly changed the rules of the game—but it has not ended the game of inequality. It has merely redesigned it.
At first glance, CUET looks like a reformer’s dream. One exam, multiple universities, uniform evaluation. For students from “low-scoring” state boards, it promises a fairer shot at institutions long dominated by CBSE and ICSE toppers. For universities, it offers administrative efficiency and insulation from legal disputes over cut-offs. In a system as vast and uneven as India’s, such centralisation can feel like overdue order.
To be fair, CUET has addressed genuine distortions in the old admissions regime. Board-based cut-offs had turned college entry into a lottery shaped by marking leniency rather than academic preparedness, forcing universities into defensive gatekeeping. A common entrance test, at least in principle, offers transparency, predictability, and a shared benchmark that students and institutions can understand. For many applicants from lesser-known boards and regions, CUET has opened doors previously closed by invisible hierarchies of evaluation. The problem, therefore, is not the idea of a national entrance test itself, but the assumption that a single instrument can capture merit across disciplines, contexts, and lived realities without continuous correction.
The most visible shift CUET has produced is the quiet eclipse of school education. Class XII board examinations—once the culmination of twelve years of learning—have been reduced to a qualifying formality. Classrooms increasingly resemble waiting rooms for entrance exams. Teachers across schools report a familiar refrain from students: “Will this come in CUET?” If the answer is no, engagement often collapses. This narrowing of purpose undermines the broader educational goals that school education is meant to serve.
Equally troubling is CUET’s dependence on the very market it was meant to weaken: the coaching industry. Standardised tests reward not just knowledge, but familiarity with exam patterns, time management strategies, and repeated mock practice. These advantages are unevenly distributed. Urban, middle-class students—armed with paid platforms, stable internet, and professional guidance—adapt quickly. First-generation learners and rural students are assured the test is “NCERT-based,” but NCERT alone rarely compensates for the structural advantages that coaching confers.
Centralisation also flattens diversity. State universities and local colleges have historically reflected regional priorities—language, social context, and community needs. CUET nudges them toward a uniform national template, where contextual admission criteria are often treated as inefficiencies rather than strengths. In the pursuit of comparability, India risks erasing the pluralism that has long defined its higher-education ecosystem.
Nowhere is this tension sharper than in the humanities. Reducing disciplines such as history, political science, or philosophy to multiple-choice questions may be administratively convenient, but it misunderstands how knowledge in these fields is cultivated and assessed. Interpretation, argument, and imagination do not sit comfortably within bubbling OMR sheets. When merit is defined narrowly, disciplines that resist standardisation are the first casualties.
None of this is an argument for returning to the tyranny of inflated cut-offs or pretending that board marks were ever truly equal. CUET has exposed real flaws in the old system. But replacing one blunt instrument with another does not amount to reform; it is merely substitution.
If CUET is to become a gateway rather than a gatekeeper, it must evolve. Universities should be allowed to combine entrance scores with board performance, written assessments, or interviews where appropriate. Public investment in free, high-quality preparation—especially offline and in regional languages—is no longer optional; it is essential. Most importantly, policymakers must resist the temptation to equate standardisation with fairness.
Education is not a factory process, and students are not uniform inputs. A just admissions system does more than rank applicants efficiently; it recognises potential in its many forms. Until CUET learns to do that, its promise of equity will remain—like many well-intentioned reforms—more aspiration than achievement.
Editor’s Note
The Common University Entrance Test is still in its early years, and its long-term effects on access, equity, and academic standards are yet to fully unfold. This article reflects the author’s assessment of emerging trends and policy trade-offs. As with any large-scale reform, CUET’s success will ultimately depend on continuous review, institutional flexibility, and sustained public investment.
