The University Grants Commission has announced this week that there will be no new engineering college or increase in seats in the existing engineering colleges in the coming academic year.
As to why this decision has been taken, UGC vice-chairperson H. Devaraj said, “AICTE reports showed that several seats were going vacant in engineering colleges, and the notification for the UGC (Affiliation of Colleges offering Technical Education by Universities) Regulations 2014 has not yet come, whereas according to a Supreme Court judgement, approvals have to be finalised by the end of April. So, there won’t be enough time.” He added that as the process is new, universities and colleges may need some more time to familiarise themselves with it.
UGC officials also said that they did not get too many enquiries about starting new colleges. “Colleges are seeing that many of their students are unemployed, so not many are expressing interest in starting new colleges. But a lot of people want to start new arts and science courses,” Devaraj said.
