The Department of Humanities and Social Sciences (HSS) is one of the earliest departments at IITM. The Department is essentially multi-disciplinary in nature and has faculty from diverse Streams, such as Development Studies, Economics, English, Environmental Studies, Film Studies, Health Studies, History, International Relations, Philosophy, Politics, and Sociology. The Department offers doctoral programmes in humanities and social sciences besides elective courses for the undergraduate and post-graduate programmes of the Institute. Since 2006-07, the Department has been offering a five-year integrated Master of Arts programme. With the launch of this programme, the Indian Institute of Technology Madras has crossed a milestone in fulfilling its role in higher education in liberal arts and social sciences in the country. This has opened avenues for highly motivated students in arts and humanities to enter IIT Madras. For more information, please visit:http://www.hss.iitm.ac.in

The Masters of Arts

Excellence in higher education in the humanities and social sciences is evidently of growing importance around the world. By imparting quality education through this programme the Institute aims at producing well-rounded indvidiuals with sound training in the humanities and social sciences to answer the needs of universities, research institutes and commercial and public sector enterprises. The programme draws its strength from the unique mix of streams.

Streams Offered

Integrated M.A. in Development Studies
Integrated M.A. in English Studies

Admission is solely through Humanities and Social Sciences Entrance Examination (HSEE). The programme has a total of 46 seats; each stream will have 23 seats. Allocations of seats to individual Streams will be made based on the academic performance of students (CGPA) during the first three semesters, students' preferences, and availability of seats under each discipline.

Candidates admitted through HSEE-2015 will have to pay the following fees at the time of admission:

All fees are subject to variation from time to time.
* SC/ST students are exempted from payment of tuition fees of Rs.3,000/-per semester irrespective of the parental income.
# Includes mess advance of Rs.12,000/-for 6 months.
The fee structure for subsequent semesters will be made available at the time of admission.

Qualifying Examination (QE):

Candidates applying for HSEE-2015 must have passed for the first time in 2014 or should be appearing in 2015 in any one of the following qualifying examinations (QE):

• The final examination of the 10+2 system, conducted by a Central or State Board recognized by the Association of Indian Universities (www.aiuweb.org).
• Intermediate or two-year Pre-University examination conducted by a Board or University recognized by the Association of Indian Universities.
• Final examination of the two-year course of the Joint Services Wing of the National Defence Academy.
• Senior Secondary School Examination conducted by the National Institute of Open Schooling with a minimum of five subjects.
• Any Public School, Board or University examination in India or in a foreign country recognized as equivalent to the 10+2 system by the Association of Indian Universities (AIU).
• H.S.C. vocational examination.
• General Certificate Education (GCE) examination (London, Cambridge or Sri Lanka) at the Advanced (A) level.
• High School Certificate Examination of the Cambridge University or International Baccalaureate Diploma of the International Baccalaureate Office, Geneva.
  
  Candidates who have completed Class XII (or equivalent) examination outside India or from a Board not specified above should produce a certificate from the Association of Indian 12 Universities to the effect that the examination they have passed is equivalent to the Class XII examination.
  
  In case the Class XII examination is not a public examination, the candidate must have passed at least one public (Board or Pre-University) examination earlier

Indian nationals belonging to certain categories are admitted under the seats reserved for them in accordance with the rules of the Government of India.

The categories and the extent of reservation are as follows:

Other Backward Classes belonging to Non-Creamy Layer (OBC-NCL).
Scheduled Caste (SC)
Scheduled Tribe (ST)
Persons with Physical Disability (PwD)

Other Backward Classes belonging to the Non-Creamy Layer (OBC-NCL): 27% of seats are reserved. The class should have been mentioned in the central list of OBCs (http://www.ncbc.nic.in) as of June 1, 2014 and the certificate should have been obtained from a competent authority (see APPENDIX – II for the format and details) on or after June 1, 2014. 10 While submitting the completed application, the candidate must submit a scanned copy of the OBC (NCL) certificate and a hard copy of the same must reach the Chairman, HSEE-2015 before January 26, 2015 failing which, the candidate will be considered as a general category candidate. If selected, the candidate must produce the original certificate at the time of admission failing which, the offer of admission will be cancelled.

Candidates belonging to the creamy layer of OBC are NOT entitled for reservation. Such candidates are treated as belonging to the general (GE, i.e., unreserved) category.

Scheduled Caste (SC) / Scheduled Tribe (ST): 15% seats are reserved for SC and 7.5% seats for are reserved for ST. The benefit of reservation will be given only to those castes and tribes that are mentioned in the respective lists of corresponding states published by the Government of India
(http://socialjustice.nic.in/sclist.php and http://tribal.nic.in/Content/list of Scheduled Tribes in India.aspx).

While submitting the completed application, the candidate must submit a scanned copy of the certificate (see APPENDIX – I for the format and details) and a hard copy of the same must reach the Chairman, HSEE-2015 before January 26, 2015 failing which, the candidate will be considered as a general category candidate. If selected, the candidate must produce the original certificate at the time of admission failing which, the offer of admission will be cancelled.

Persons with Physical Disability (PwD): 3% of seats are reserved in every category, i.e., GE, OBC-NCL, SC and ST. Benefit would be given to those who have at least 40% impairment irrespective of the type of disability i.e., locomotor, visual or dyslexic. Leprosycured candidates who are otherwise fit to pursue the course are also included in this subcategory. Candidates are advised to ensure that the certificate is in accordance with the latest guidelines of the Government of India (visit the web site of the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, Department of Disability Affairs for latest information).

While submitting the completed application, the candidate must submit a scanned copy of the certificate issued by a district medical board/competent authority in the prescribed format (see APPENDIX – III for details) and a hard copy of the same must reach the Chairman, HSEE- 2015 before January 26, 2015. If selected, the candidate must produce the original certificate at the time of admission failing which, the offer of admission will be cancelled.

Candidates belonging to the OBC-NCL, SC, ST and PwD categories will be declared as qualified on the basis of a relaxed criterion.

Unfilled seats in the OBC-NCL category can be allotted to GE category candidates whereas seats remaining vacant under the SC and ST categories shall NOT be allotted to candidates belonging to other categories. The reservation for PwD candidates is horizontal and hence, unfilled seats will be allotted to candidates belonging to the respective categories i.e., unfilled SCPwD seats will be allotted to candidates belonging to the SC category and so on.

The category chosen by a candidate at the time of registration for HSEE-2015 will be final and requests for change of category will NOT be entertained.

Foreign Nationals:

Admission to the M.A. program for all foreign nationals will be made through HSEE-2015 only. Foreign nationals are outside the ambit of reservation of seats under the OBC-NCL, SC, ST and PwD categories as specified herein. Seats allotted to foreign nationals are supernumerary. The number of such seats will be made known at the time of admission.

• Admission to a candidate will stand cancelled, if the proof of having passed the QE, as per the eligibility criteria specified in Section 13.2, is not submitted to the Institute latest by September 29, 2015.
• Admissions are subject to verification of facts from the original certificates / documents of the candidates. If an applicant is found ineligible at a later date even after admission, his/her admission will be cancelled. The decision of the HSEE Admission Committee regarding the eligibility of any applicant shall be final.
• A candidate must satisfy all the aforesaid eligibility criteria in order to be eligible for appearing in HSEE-2015 / admission.

The entrance examination will be conducted in the following nine cities:

Bangalore, Chennai, Coimbatore, Hyderabad, Kochi, Kolkata, Mumbai, New Delhi, and Thiruvananthapuram.

If sufficient number of candidates are not available at any of the above listed cities, the same may be dropped, and the candidates will be allocated to a centre in any of the other cities. The address of an Examination Centre for a candidate will be mentioned in the Admit Card, which can be generated online. Request from a candidate for change of city/town allotted to him/her will NOT be entertained under any circumstances.

Contact Details

The Chairman, HSEE-2015,
JEE Office,
IIT Madras,
Chennai–600036

Phone : (044) 2257 8220
Fax : (044) 22578224
Email : hsee@iitm.ac.in
HSEE website : http://hsee.iitm.ac.in