SINGAPORE - Ninety-one primary schools, including Temasek Primary, Mee Toh School and Nan Chiau Primary, were oversubscribed when the most competitive portion of the annual Primary 1 registration exercise - Phase 2C - closed on Friday.

The Education Ministry (MOE) will release the list of schools requiring a ballot on Monday, and all of these 91 are expected to be on it.

Rulang Primary in Jurong West and Rosyth School in Serangoon were the most oversubscribed schools. Rosyth received 95 applications, about three times more than the 29 places it has. The situation was similar at Rulang, which had 98 hopefuls vying for 29 places.

Horizon Primary in Punggol, which has 96 places for phase 2C, had 177 applicants. This means it will have to turn away at least 81 pupils.

At this time last year, 99 primary schools had more applicants than places, and 91 of them had to go through a ballot.

The fewer number of oversubscribed schools in this phase could be due to a new MOE rule that kicked in this year. All primary schools have to set aside 20 places in phases 2B and 2C each before the start of the registration exercise. This will help ensure that there are places left at popular schools for children with no connections to them.

Phase 2C is for children with no affiliations to their preferred primary schools. The earlier phases are for children with siblings who are current or former pupils, and children whose parents are old boys and girls, grassroots leaders, school volunteers, or are members of an affiliated church or clan.