Inspection Effect

Mohammed Younus/ Hyderabad : With the Telangana government deciding to do away with tuition fee reimbursement and replacing it with Financial Assistance to Students of Telangana (FAST), admissions to private engineering colleges are likely to see a sharp decline this year. Adding to their woes is the nativity rule, which considers 1956 as the cut off year for availing FAST.

Stringent rules for FAST, inspections to spell doom for several colleges having poor infrastructure

Educationists said that the latest round of re-inspection of engineering colleges by Jawahar Lal Nehru Technological University task force officials in the State earlier this week would surely spell doom for many colleges, as most of them were found ‘not maintaining’ the required standards. They said that around 100 engineering colleges may have to shut down if inspections are conducted in a strict manner, as directed by Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao. The CM ordered these inspections after receiving concrete information that most of the engineering colleges did not fulfill the criteria of an ‘ideal engineering college’ as prescribed by the All-India Council for Technical Education.

At the same time, more than 120 of the 335 colleges in the State were on government radar for having poor infrastructure. The recently released Government Task Force report on the functioning of private engineering colleges has painted a grim picture of infrastructure in private engineering colleges across the state. Confirming these fears, Telangana Engineering Professional College Managements Association (TEPCMA) chairman N Goutham Rao said that 1956 as cut off would indeed have an adverse impact on admissions.

Reacting to the ongoing inspection of the engineering colleges, he said that inspection was already done in May 2014 and re-inspection was not necessary. He said that these days, parents and students themselves were inspecting the colleges before taking admissions and termed it as ‘social inspection’.

Last year, around 50 per cent seats in engineering colleges were left vacant due to the chaos surrounding the bifurcation of state. In 2012, around one lakh seats remained vacant, he said. TEPMCA member I Krishna Rao said that government has to give some time for colleges to update their infrastructure and to attain the standards prescribed by government. Telangana Government Junior College Lecturers Association president P Madhusudan Reddy said that several colleges may have to close down if inspection is done as per the rule book.