NEW DELHI: With admissions under PWD (Persons with Disability) category being decentralized, DU's Equal Opportunity Cell — which facilitated admissions into this category till last year — is working on a system that will make the process easier for applicants. A soon-to-be-constituted central enabling committee will serve as a monitoring body and also issue a special set of guidelines for colleges.

"There will be separate help desks in every college for applicants of this category that will be run by NSS (National Service Scheme) and NCC volunteers. There will also be a separate accessible window for issue and receipt of forms in colleges," says Bipin Tiwari, officer on special duty, Equal Opportunity Cell.

Students from other states will register online and their certificates will be verified at the time of admission. The EOC is also exploring the possibility of setting up a helpline. Tiwari says EOC officials will be going to various centres in the city to hold orientation programmes—of the kind the university organized over Monday and Tuesday—for disabled students. They are starting with Delhi-based NGO, National Association of the Blind's Centre for Blind Women and Disability in Hauz Khas.

"Instead of making them come to us, we are going to them," says Tiwari. "The advantage of decentralizing," he continues, "Is that students will go to the colleges and see for themselves the availability and quality of infrastructure, degree of accessibility, distance from the places where they will be staying and the courses. They can take admission accordingly. Earlier, they used to be assigned colleges and would later discover they didn't want what they got."