Mumbai: It appears that a number of college students in the city are still reeling from the learning loss caused during Covid-19 pandemic, as almost half the University of Mumbai (MU) BCom students who repeated their Sem V exam failed yet again.

As many as 36,105 final year BCom students had registered for the Sem V repeat exam in April-May this year, after failing the regular test in November-December last year. Of these only 16,782 manage to clear all the papers, registering a success rate of 51.36%. The students’ performance was even worse in the regular Sem V test, with only a third of them, 34.25% to be precise, passing the exam.

The BCom students form the largest cohort of students enrolled at colleges affiliated to MU. The last batch of final year students, who were supposed to have graduated in 2022-23, hadn’t faced the conventional physical semester-end exams during their first and second years of the course, as the teaching and evaluation process had shifted online due to the pandemic. 

“The students are struggling to write papers, as we have switched back to the subjective question pattern of exams. But the results indicate that they have improved over time,” said a university official.

The impact of Covid isn’t limited to Commerce stream. Similar results were recorded for Sem V exams of the two other major courses, BA and BSc, where only 33.45% and 36.27% had passed the exam. The varsity is yet to declare the results of repeat exams for these programmes.

There are little signs of improvement as the passing rates for the regular Sem VI exams for all three courses, also held in April-May, are still below 40% and are only slightly better than the regular Sem V exam. 

On the other hand, students enrolled in self-financed courses have fared much better. For example, the success rate in the regular Bachelor of Management Studies (BMS) Sem V exam was 70.28%, which rose to 71% in Sem VI.

Arvind Luhar, a Commerce Professor at Ismail Yusuf College in Jogeshwari and a Member of MU’s Academic Council, said that the students are facing trouble with practical-oriented subjects such as Financial Accountancy, Cost Accountancy and Taxation.

“The students lost touch with practical subjects as there were no physical classes during the pandemic. Besides, many students had lost their focus on education as they were more concerned about meeting the financial needs of their families. While we are conducting remedial coaching, the aftershocks of Covid-19 are still felt. Hopefully, the results will be back to the normal level,” he said.