CHENNAI: It’s quite clear Anna University (AU) is not going to conduct the engineering counselling in the State this year.
AU Vice-Chancellor MK Surappa on Friday told Express he was in no mood to take back his resignation as chairman of the Tamil Nadu Engineering Admissions (TNEA) and Tamil Nadu Common Admissions. On the other hand, higher education secretary Mangat Ram Sharma said that no efforts would be made to convince Surappa to reconsider.
“I have clearly written to the higher education secretary that AU will not be a part of the counselling this year and I stand by my decision,” said Surappa. Notably, he resigned from the chairman’s post recently as he was upset with the untimely reconstitution of TNEA committee without his consultation. Commissioner of DoTE, Vivekanandan was made co-chairman of the committee which irked Surappa.
Sources said the committee was constituted in November 2017 for a period of three years, but suddenly the committee was reconstituted recently. Meanwhile, Sharma, speaking to Express, said students have no reason to worry at all as engineering counselling would be conducted properly.
“Whether counselling is conducted by AU or DoTE, there is nothing to worry about it. All measures will be taken to ensure that the counselling is done in a systematic and appropriate manner. We will ensure that students will face no problem at all,” said Sharma.
Asked whether any efforts will be made to convince Surappa to continue in the chairman’s post, Sharma replied, “No such plans”. He said that they were yet to decide which organisation would conduct the counselling this time. Sharma had earlier said that the reconstitution of the committee was a routine process and the issue was unnecessarily being blown out of proportions.
Sources in the university said that as both sides are adamant, there is no way the dispute will be resolved. “It seems the counselling this year will be handled by the Directorate of Technical Education (DoTE) as both parties are not ready to discuss and resolve the issue. Ultimately, the students will be affected as AU has been handling the counselling for the last two decades,” said a senior official of the university.