BENGALURU: Over 800 engineering colleges across the nation have been asked to shut down from the next academic year.
Following low admissions over the past five years, the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) has asked these colleges to close down and submit a report by the second week of September.
AICTE authorities said colleges with less than 30% admissions in the last five years have been asked to close down. “We have also given them an option of getting merged with nearby colleges,” said AICTE chairman Dr Anil Sahasrabudhe. “The decision to close down colleges was taken after studying details of intake at all colleges across the country in the last five years,” he added.
While Karnataka has 600 colleges, the list of colleges asked to shut down has not been made public.
The listed colleges have been asked to submit a report on their choice of closing down or merging with another college as the change will be effective from 2018-19 academic year. “This is one of the many steps planned towards improving the quality of engineering education. Some institutions failed to improve admissions and hence we had to take a tough call,” said AICTE authorities.
There are 10,361 engineering colleges in the country. Maharashtra has maximum of about 1,500 colleges, followed by Tamil Nadu (about 1,300), Uttar Pradesh (1,165), and Andhra Pradesh (about 800). Of the 37 lakh engineering seats, over 27 lakh have been lying vacant.
Colleges seek time
Some colleges in the State have requested the authorities for at least one more year to improve. A representative of a college from Bengaluru said, “We are trying to improve the admissions, but as the demand is less, we are struggling.”