COIMBATORE: The availability of BE/BTech seats in Tamil Nadu is all set to shoot past the 2.65 lakh mark this year with the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) allowing existing engineering colleges to add an additional 40,000 seats in undergraduate courses. The apex regulatory agency for technical education has sanctioned the increased intake of students at a time when nearly 65,000 out of the total 2.26 lakh BE/BTech seats had gone abegging in the State in the academic year 2011-12.
“We have allowed applications from many of the existing 525 engineering colleges to either increase their students’ intake in specific branches or start a new course. Cumulatively, the additional seats for the academic year 2012-13 would work out to around 40,000,” a source in the AICTE said.
The AICTE has also granted permission for setting up 14 self-financing engineering colleges in Tamil Nadu. “Each new college will have around 300 seats. We have also granted approval to establish 14 polytechnic colleges, nine management institutions and three technical campuses. This year no new institution was accorded approval to start the Masters in Computer Application programme,” the official said.
The AICTE is expected to send the updated seat matrix to the Directorate of Technical Education in two or three weeks. So far this year, the Anna University, Chennai, has sold 1.85 lakh application forms for the Tamil Nadu Engineering Admissions single window counselling. Last year, out of the 2,26,034 seats available in 525 engineering colleges in TN, only 1,61,154 seats were filled. The remaining 64,880 seats had no takers.