If you’re a Mumbai University student, you can be ‘punished’ for scoring higher marks.

The university has passed an ordinance almost to this effect. Here on, students scoring 20% higher marks in internal assessments than in external exams will have the ‘excess’ marks cut from their semester results. A circular was sent to all colleges early this week.

The regulation will come into force in the current academic year itself. It will cover all under-graduate and post-graduate courses in the science, arts and commerce streams.

The move will hit over 6 lakh students in 600 colleges across six districts. End-semester exams are just a few days away.

The university hit upon this idea after a committee, probing complaints of inflated marks by some colleges in the internal exams in 2011-12, submitted its findings.

It had randomly selected three colleges — Lords Universal college, Prakash College and Gokhale Education Society — to probe the allegations after the 2011-12 exams. It first introduced the 40:60

(internal:external) formula in TYBCom. Irregularities were found in Lords and Prakash College mark sheets.

Though the academic council had devised the “scaling down” formula in April this year, the university endorsed it through Regulation 8668 only last week.

Colleges and departments have advised teachers to be strict while granting marks in internal assessments.

Internal assessments, also known as comprehensive and continuous evaluation (CCE), carry 40:60 weightage in the credit-based semester system.

Senate member Sanjay Vairal termed the move insensitive. “People running the university are extremely insensitive to students. They should have devised a formula to punish erring colleges and not the students.”

Many of the students dna spoke to also echoed the same views.

The scaling-down policy may affect their grading in the final year when results of all semesters would be taken into consideration.

A principal condemned the timing of the move. “The rule should have come up at the beginning of academic year, that is June.” However, Chaitaly Chakravarty, principal, Thakur College, supported the move.

Pro-vice chancellor Naresh Chandra said, “We have found inflated scores in internal assessments at few colleges.... Our intention is good.”

Pune University, which has rolled out the credit based system in colleges from this year, has also introduced a similar policy.

Cutting the flabEvery subject would be considered for scaling down. Take for example, a commerce student getting 38 out of 40 in Accounts internal assessment and 30 out of 60 in end-semester exams. Converted to percentage, it would be 95% in internal and 50% in the latter. To bring the difference of 45% to 20%, internal marks would be scaled down to 24.