

BENGALURU: Considering the lack of infrastructure and low admissions, the All Indian Council for Technical Education (AICTE) has disaffiliated over 800 technical and management institutions across the nation, including six from Karnataka. Two private engineering colleges, including one each from Bengaluru and Kalaburagi, have been recommended for permanent closure with effect from 2018-19 academic year. Rest four are management and science institutions offering MBA and MCA courses. Appa Institute of Engineering Technology, Kalaburagi; Nandi Institute of Technology, Bengaluru; Institute for Technology and Management, Bengaluru; Mount Carmel Institute of Management, Bengaluru; RS College of Management and Science, Bengaluru and Danamma Channabasavaiah Institute of Management Science, Kolar are the colleges which are likely to close down.
The institutes which have been issued closure notice are not allowed to admit students for batches starting from 2018. Those who have already got admissions can continue till they get their graduation certificates.
According to AICTE sources, some of these colleges requested for closure on their own as they were not able to get sufficient students. “The engineering college from Bengaluru requested for closure and we agreed,” said an official source from the AICTE.
Across the nation, the AICTE has recommended for closure of 800 such institutions of which 200 are engineering colleges. Over 150 such colleges are from Tamil Nadu. With the latest closure notice, the engineering seats will come down in India by 80,000.
“As the number of engineering seats falling vacant every year is increasing across the nation, the AICTE has decided to shut down substandard engineering colleges. As per our data, the actual enrolment at engineering colleges has come down by 1.86 lakh since 2012-13 academic year, and annually there is fall of about 75,000 engineering seats across the nation,” said an official from AICTE on the condition of anonymity.
List of colleges that will shut down
Appa Institute of Engineering Technology, Kalaburagi
Nandi Institute of Technology, Bengaluru
Institute for Technology and Management, Bengaluru
Mount Carmel Institute of Management, Bengaluru
RS College of Management and Science, Bengaluru
Danamma Channabasavaiah Institute of Management Science, Kolar
Only 1 private engg college gets AICTE approval this year
Karnataka has got only one new private engineering college approved this academic year. The two government engineering colleges proposed to function from 2018-19 academic year—one at Talakal and another at Gangavati at Koppal district have not received approval from the AICTE. Officials concerned have blamed the model code of conduct for it. “Everything was ready. But as the poll code was in place we could not provide other infrastructure like library and furniture. We requested AICTE for two months time after elections, but they did not oblige,” said HU Talwar, director state department of technical education.
VTU students want three months for internships
Bengaluru: A group of students of Visvesvaraya Technological University (VTU), Belagavi have started an online petition for change in the internship pattern that the university has introduced. Over 1,400 students have already signed the petition. They are demanding three months off to take up their internship programme, which is now a part of the course. Presently, the university only gives only one month’s time for the students to carry out their internships. But, students are protesting against the university stating that this is not enough as companies do not offer any internships for such a short duration.