CHENNAI: About 90% of the general category students, who have participated in the first round of the Tamil Nadu engineering counselling, have confirmed their tentative allocation of seats.

A total of 39,146 students, who secured 200-179 cut-off marks, were eligible to participate in the first round of counselling that started on July 14. On July 16, students filled their preferred choices of courses and colleges.

A senior official from the Directorate of Technical Education (DOTE) told the DT Next on Friday that after the filling of choices, the tentative allotment of seats was given to the students on Thursday (July 17).

"The confirmation of tentative allotment by students was over by 5 pm on Thursday", he added.

Citing data, the official said that of the total 39,146 students who were eligible to participate in the first round of counselling, about 90%, or about 35,200 students, have confirmed their tentative seat allocations, which is high compared to last year.

"Last year, it was between 80 and 85%," he recalled.

The DOTE official said that the students who have confirmed their engineering seats should also accept the joining date on or before July 23.

He said the second round of counselling, which will begin on July 26, will be interesting since a total of 1,37,710 students, who secured cut-off marks between 178.9 and 143, are expected to participate.

"There would be more students to confirm their tentative allocations this year," he added.