Friday, October 31, 2008
CHENNAI: New guidelines have come into effect for facilitating the transfer of students from one engineering college to another in Tamil Nadu. From now on, requests from students for transfer from one college to another will not be entertained during even-semester sessions or in the middle of an academic year.

Students can seek a transfer only during the beginning of the third, fifth or seventh semester, which marks the beginning of a new academic year. The rules will be applicable to students who have enrolled in engineering colleges under the government quota as well as management quota. However, students of private and deemed universities cannot seek a transfer.


Higher education principal secretary K Ganesan has issued an order notifying the revised guidelines, which replace the nearly 10-year old rules that were adhered to while processing requests from undergraduate students for a transfer to another college. One of the factors that guided the revision exercise was that while from 2001 to 2007 all engineering colleges in the state were affiliated to the Anna University in Chennai, now the colleges come under the distributed jurisdiction of the technical university in Chennai, Coimbatore, Tiruchi and Tirunelveli.

According to K Ganesan, the new guidelines which were suggested by commissioner for technical education V K Jayakodi in September have been accepted and approved by the government for implementation from the current academic year.

While students studying in government or aided colleges can seek a transfer only to another government or aided institutions, requests for transfer from students of self-financing colleges will be considered only if they want to join another private institution. The application seeking transfer will be approved subject to the condition that vacancies are available in that particular branch of study within the sanctioned intake for the particular course.

Students studying in the constituent colleges of the Anna University can seek a transfer to another constituent college or government/aided college and vice-versa subject to availability of vacancies. “The student who is seeking a transfer should have passed in all subjects for which examination had been conducted by the university to which the college (where the student is currently studying) is affiliated to up to the last semester. This is applicable for students who had enrolled under the regular study as well as lateral entry,” Ganesan said.

A no objection certificate must be obtained from the technical university to which the college in which the student is seeking admission for processing the application. “Such an NOC is not required if students apply for a transfer in the third semester,” Ganesan said in his order.

In the case of students studying in colleges outside Tamil Nadu, applications will be considered only if the university to which the college is affiliated is recognised by the respective state and approved by the UGC. Such students should also obtain an NOC from the university to which the college in which they are seeking an admission on transfer is affiliated to.