Monday, July 07, 2008
Chennai: Technical education in Tamil Nadu is set for a big leap with 71 new self-financing engineering colleges being established from this academic year. This, along with the six new government engineering colleges, effectively takes the number of technical institutions to 349, putting the state as the frontrunner in the field.

While the first self-financing engineering college in Tamil Nadu was established in 1984, the numbers started increasing significantly only in the later half of the nineties. With many engineering graduates landing plum jobs in information technology companies and the booming manufacturing sector, the state has witnessed frenzied growth in the field of technical education over the past five years.


"The All-India Council for Technical Education has inspected these institutions and approved their applications to start operations this year. Seven of these are exclusive women's engineering colleges, which will function from Perundurai, Kumarapalayam, Sivakasi, Tiruchengode, Athur, Sankari and Chengalpattu," AICTE southern regional chairman, Professor M S Palanichamy, told The Times of India on Sunday. Over 100 applications to establish new colleges were submitted to the AICTE.

While the women's colleges will each have a sanctioned intake of 300 students, the co-educational institutions will admit 240 each. "One college in Paramakudi had sought permission to admit 180 students," Palanichamy added.

This means an increase of 17,400 BE/BTech seats this year. Most of the new colleges are being established near Chennai and in the western districts of Coimbatore, Erode, Dharmapuri, Salem and Krishnagiri

Education consultant Jayaprakash Gandhi pointed out that in 2007 only 20 new engineering colleges were established in Tamil Nadu. "Last year, Anna University (Chennai) issued call letters to 84,881 aspirants for filling up 58,236 BE/B.Tech government quota seats through single window admissions. This year, with the new colleges also contributing to the common pool, the number of seats in the government quota could well cross 75,000. The number of aspirants this year is over 1.27 lakh," he said.

The mushrooming number of private engineering colleges have, however, given rise to concerns about the quality of infrastructure and the standard of education. Over the past five years, at least 10,000 seats in self-financing engineering colleges have had no takers annually due to poor quality of infrastructure and the academic ambience.

The mushrooming number of private engineering colleges have, however, given rise to concerns about the quality of infrastructure and the standard of education. Over the past five years, at least 10,000 seats in self-financing engineering colleges have had no takers annually due to poor quality of infrastructure and the academic ambience.

However, Anna University (Chennai) vice chancellor P Mannar Jawahar said, "Only colleges which have good infrastructure and faculty will survive. The market factor will automatically come into play and those without infrastructure will die down."