VIJAYAWADA: Announcing that classes for Intermediate second year only will start on November 2 and the classes for first year students will begin on November 16, Education Minister Audimulapu Suresh said that parents and students need not worry on the availability of first year seats though more than 400 junior colleges in the State were not permitted to conduct classes this academic year.
Clarifying doubts regarding admissions into first year Intermediate at a press conference here on Saturday, he said, "As many as 6,31,274 students have passed the SSC exam. We have a total of 5,83,780 Intermediate seats available in all streams in junior colleges in the State, including newly established institutions. As many as 107 new general category colleges and 43 new vocational colleges have been given formal approval. "
"While 32,400 seats are available in the new general colleges, there are 11,000 seats in the new vocational colleges. Around 5.5 lakh students are expected to take admission in junior colleges this year. So the students and parents need not to worry," he added.
The Education Minister said that a total of 2,07,040 seats are available in 647 aided colleges, 47,740 seats in 598 vocational/social/tribal welfare colleges and approximately 2,59,400 seats in private unaided colleges and 26,100 seats in unaided vocational colleges.
Board of Intermediate Education Commissioner V Ramakrishna said 401 out of the total 2,844 college applications were rejected this year as they do not have requisite infrastructure to run Intermediate classes. Some colleges are functioning in commercial complexes or ACC sheds. Some other colleges failed to furnish the requisite information on the BIE website for getting permission.
Classes for second, third year students of degree colleges to begin on December 1
The names of the colleges were not displayed on the BIE website due to the aforementioned reasons. With respect to the status of online admissions, Suresh said that 1,69,589 registrations have been received, 1,33,100 applications have been filled and 1,20,852 applications have completed the web options as on October 29.
"As per the circular issued earlier, none of the colleges are supposed to admit students or collect fee till the academic year begins. However, some of the colleges have collected the fee and admitted students. We will ensure that the money collected is refunded in case of excess or improper collection," said the Education Minister.
Suresh informed that classes for the second and third year students of degree colleges in the State will begin on December 1.
Explaining the COVID-19 guidelines to ensure the safety of students, Suresh said, "Classes will be conducted for half day in the colleges with a strength of less than 100, for the colleges with a strength of 101 to 500, classes will be conducted in two sessions - 8 am to 1 pm and 1 pm to 6 pm. However, the managements of colleges with a strength of 500 to 1,600 have been instructed to divide students of each stream in two groups."
"Classes will be conducted in two sessions for the first group of different streams on day one and classes will be conducted in two sessions for the second group of different streams on day two. Like this, each group will have classes thrice a week. The day on which a group will not have classes, it will attend online classes and take video lessons from home. The decision to conduct classes for which stream during which session will be taken by respective college principals," he added.
35 per cent of inter syllabus cut
After condensing the syllabus in view of the delay in commencement of academic year due to Covid-19, the State Council of Educational Research and Training (SCERT) stated that 35 per cent of the syllabus has been reduced for students of first and second year Intermediate for the year 2020-21