Around 80,000 candidates expected to opt for engineering courses

About 1.10 lakh eligible students have enrolled themselves for getting admission to various engineering courses while a little over 1.7 lakh engineering seats are available at as many as 509 engineering colleges in Tamil Nadu. According to sources from Anna University, the online counselling will be conducted in five rounds. In each round, about 10,000 candidates are expected to participate in the online counselling, which is also conducted at student’s facilitation centres established across all districts of the State.

As the first round of counselling is nearing completion, only about 8,000 candidates have made the payment despite about 10,000 candidates figuring in the merit list. A senior professor from Anna University said even among the registered candidates, not all of them would join engineering courses, as many students have already opted out after getting through medical counselling. “In addition, many candidates also prefer non-engineering courses”, he added. 

Stating that this year most of the students, who came for counselling, have preferred Electronic and Communication and Computer Science courses, the professor said, “Not all of them will get these courses.” The professor also pointed out that civil engineering course is expected to be the last choice among the students, as there was no big jump in the construction and real estate sector. 

“Though All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) had asked to close down institutions with less than 30 per cent of admission, college owners are reluctant to do it,” he added. Of the total seats available in institutions in the state, nearly 1.5 lakh seats are in self-financing colleges, while intake for government engineering colleges is about 3,700 seats and government aided colleges is little more than 2,400 seats. Also, 8,500 seats are available at Anna University’s constituent colleges