Once the most sought-after course for every Intermediate passout in the state, engineering shows no indication of reviving its past glory. In fact, aspiring engineers from Andhra Pradesh are facing a problem of excess colleges even as their counterparts are scrambling for seats across the country.
About 1.08 lakh seats, including convener quota and merit list seats, were left vacant in the first phase of EAMCET counselling that concluded in the state last week, showing a clear indication of falling interest in technical education.
Only 1.3 lakh students out of 2.18 lakh EAMCET qualified candidates attended the first phase of counselling, though a whopping 2.25 lakh seats are available in both government and private colleges. However, all the seats were filled in 62 out of 609 private engineering colleges and also 30 out of 34 government engineering colleges.
At least 13 out of the 609 private engineering colleges recorded zero admission this year as there have been no takers. “Another 34 colleges registered admissions with less than 10 students. These students might opt for other colleges in the second phase as it is not economically viable for these colleges to run with just 10 students,” said an official at the EAMCET counselling centre in Sanketika Vidya Bhavan in Hyderabad. A total 84 colleges have managed to get less than 20 students and hence, they are likely to approach the All India Council of Technical Education (AICTE) asking for orders to close down the institutes.
While a section of the managements of private engineering colleges blame the ongoing political turmoil in the state for the vacant seats, another section blames the permissions given by the AICTE and the government to increase seats and start new colleges without blinking twice, eventhough over a lakh merit quota seats lie vacant every year.
“Counselling has been disrupted in Seemandhra region since the first day discouraging many students from turning up at the counselling centres. A majority of these students skipped counselling and opted for colleges like IITs outside the state fearing more disruption to academic activities in the coming days,” complained a private engineering college-owner from Visakhapatnam. The situation is not different in Telangana where a majority of the top rankers opted for IITs to avoid any disruption to their academics due to the political uncertainity.
As the second phase of counselling is set to begin on September 24 till September 27, EAMCET officials are optimistic that at least 2,000-5,000 students will take admissions in the final phase of counselling. Engineering college managements too hope that the recent announcement of the Central government to set up an IT Investment Region that requires a workforce of about 25 lakh, might encourage more students to take up engineering courses in future.
Allotment of seats after the final phase of counselling will be done on September 29. Eamcet officials said students who did not get their certificates verified earlier should do it during the second phase of counselling at any helpline centre.
Electronics and communication engineering (ECE) continues to rule the roost in engineering admissions. Ever since the global recession which affected the IT sector drastically in 2007-08, a large number of engineering students have been opting for core courses like ECE. The courses preferred by most students this year were favourites even during last year. The trend is expected to continue further this year in the second phase of counselling.
In all, 33,557 seats in ECE were filled in the first phase of counselling. While computer science engineering (CSE) had 24,523 takers and 24,036 students opted for the mechanical stream, a total of 16,480 students opted for electronics and electrical engineering (EEE).
